


The World Next Door

by WareWolf



Series: Best Endeavours [3]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: AU post season 12, Bobby loves Crowley, Crowley lives., Established Crowley (Supernatural)/Bobby Singer, Jack is an infant under Lucifer's control., M/M, crowley loves bobby
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-02
Updated: 2019-08-11
Packaged: 2019-10-02 18:58:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 9
Words: 35,304
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17269265
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WareWolf/pseuds/WareWolf
Summary: Lucifer has created chaos and confusion across Earth.  Various people are missing across more than one reality.  Crowley, ex-King of Hell, and Bobby Singer, ex-deceased hunter, are the main characters, trying to return Castiel's spirit to his vessel and find Kyra, kidnapped by Lucifer's demons.





	1. 300 Bitches and Bastards

Bobby Singer fell heavily to the ground from several yards up.  That was how it felt anyway, though if he really had fallen that far, he supposed he’d be dead.  In the next moment, something even heavier thumped on top of him and a raspy British voice could be heard cursing the Devil and all his works.

“Get off me, you idjit,” the hunter growled.  “Get your damn shoe out of my balls.”

The ground under him was hard, cold and wet, and he slipped several times as he tried to right himself and climb to his feet.  Even so, he had to grin when he saw Crowley, King of Hell, standing in front of him.  Crowley was liberally mud-splattered, his fine black suit smeared and dishevelled, even his beard thick with dirt.  His eyes gleamed red with annoyance, but he let out a relieved sigh when he turned and saw Bobby on his feet.  Bobby was also relieved, but showed it by glaring at him.

“Where’d you take us, the Arctic?  And where are Sam and Dean?”

“Not in this delightful field, that’s all I know, darling.”

“Which is where?”

“When I ported us, I was thinking more of _away_ than anything precise, which should have meant we arrived about ten miles away from where we started.  But it’s possible that we’re in the last place you considered home.”

“Charming?”  Bobby studied the rather barren landscape carefully and shrugged to him.  “Could be.  There’s a road, let’s find some signs.  Unless you can port us directly to town, which would be nice, since it looks like the sun’s going down, despite it being full _dark_ when we were in Winterridge, and this is damn cold.”

“Sorry, all used up.”

“Wouldn’t go that far,” Bobby said, managing a grin as he heard Crowley’s snort.  He put an arm around the demon’s shoulders and urged him along.  It didn’t take long before they did find the town sign and stood on the road, looking at the confirmation of Crowley’s guess.  Someone had defaced the original sign, so that “CHARMING:  POPULATION 14,675” now read “ABOUT 300 BITCHES AND BASTARDS!”

Bobby regarded the town motto with ironic appreciation.  _Our Name Says It All._ “C’mon,” he said to the King of Hell.  “I think we’re nearly home, honey.”

Moments later, Crowley’s shoulder tightened under his hand and with inhuman speed, he gripped Bobby’s arm and pushed him to the ground, so hard and fast that Bobby cried out in shock and pain.  But no objection.  Not when he had also felt the bullet pass his shoulder.

“First and last warning,” a man’s voice shouted from the direction of the nearby woods.  “Undertaker, you get on the ground too, now.”

Crowley’s snarl was nothing human, nor were the words he spat, but the fact that he obeyed told Bobby he hadn’t lied about his power being drained.  If the shooter came too close, he was going to find himself being offered up as a new source.  He stayed put, despite the presence of broken-up road surface pressing into his face.

“Okay,”  said the same voice from several yards closer.  “Here’s how it goes.  We don’t like strangers coming to our town no more and we don’t like monsters.  I don’t recognise you.  I start shooting when I stop talking.  So you say some words that convince me you got a right to come into Charming and I don’t kill you...”

“I’m Bobby Singer,”  Bobby said, trying to speak clearly without getting a mouthful of muddy gravel.  “The Sons know me and they know my partner Fergus McLeod here.  Ask Jax or Tig or Bobby Elvis.”

“What’s Tig’s girlfriend’s name?”

“Venus.”

“He’s got it,” someone else called, further away.  “Hold them while I go get somebody.”

The shooter did not bother to make conversation.  It was at least twenty minutes before he spoke again.  “Sorry to interrupt whatever, Tig.  You know these guys?”

“I don’t usually see ‘em from this side but yeah,” came Tig’s voice.  “Maybe Singer sees Fergus that way but I sure don’t.  Get up already, you guys.”

Bobby’s traitorous knees locked on him and he had to accept Crowley’s help to get up, then stood with a hand pressed against the small of his aching back, glaring at the unknown man who stood with Tig, who seemed to be without his Harley.  The stranger did not wear Sons’ colors and the rifle was a type any farmer might possess.  “You two alone?” the biker asked.

“Yeah,” Bobby said, before Crowley could qualify that.  He didn’t think doubts would go down well.  Tig studied them for a while longer, clearly still suspicious, then patted the other man’s shoulder.

“Thanks, Bill.  You done good.  Somebody’ll be up to relieve you soon as I get back to pass the word.  I’ll take ém in.”

*

The clubhouse of the Sons of Anarchy was now the centre of what remained of the town of Charming.  Fires burned in metal bins, with people standing around them, all armed.   Several caravans and motorhomes were now parked outside Teller Morrow, with people coming and going regularly from them.  Tig marched Bobby and Crowley past everyone, into the clubhouse and right up to where Jax Teller was talking to a group of townsfolk.

“Look what I got,” he announced.  “Bill found ém at the city limits.”

Jax’s stunned look was kind of overkill, Bobby thought.  They had only been gone a few days and the fact of their return, after some kind of trouble which had separated them from Sam, Dean and Kyra, was hardly as shocking as all that, given the circumstances.  But Jax was staring at them as though they’d risen from the dead.

“Fuck, didn’t expect to see you again,” Jax said.  “What’s it been – must be six months?”

_Which explains the cold.  Not climate-control courtesy of Lucifer, it’s just run of the mill winter._

He wanted to ask Crowley if this sort of delayed-transit was a thing that happened, but knew he couldn’t, not here in public.  The young biker chief studied the weary, sodden look of them.

“Yeah, well, we didn’t expect to be back here,”  Bobby mumbled.

“Tig, take ém to get some food and I’ll chat to them later,” Jax said and Tig nodded.

“I told Bill I’d send somebody out.”

“Sure, do that.”

They got a wash as well;  a couple of buckets of water not much warmer than what had been in the field, but they made use of it and changed into clothes brought by Tig – jeans and plaid shirts that had Crowley cursing direly.  Bobby’s clothes remained in a pile on the dresser, while the demon tenderly hung up his filthy suit on a hanger behind the door of the small bedroom Tig had taken them to, stroking the lapel of the coat. 

Bobby watched him;  nearly commented a couple of times but stopped himself.  He knew the look of Crowley when he didn’t want to answer something and he knew better to think it was safe to push him.  Crowley moved past a mirror on the dresser and made a wordless sound of disgust, wiping at his beard.  He turned to glare at the hunter, who raised his hands defensively.  “Hey, c’mon, I didn’t say a thing!”  Bobby had not reached his current age – well, trips to Hell and Heaven aside – by ignoring his instincts.

There was a knock on the door, which Bobby opened, letting in a pretty dark-haired girl with two plates of food on a tray.  The lighting  - via oil lamp – wasn’t strong enough to tell him for sure what the meat was, but he suspected rabbit.  “I got your dinner,” she greeted them.  Bobby could not remember her from before and hoped he wasn’t supposed to.  “I’m Annette.”

“I don’t suppose there’s laundry service, is there, sweetheart?” Crowley asked, as though the answer hardly mattered.  He nodded towards his suit.  Annette drew in a gasp of horror.  “What _happened_ to it?  Were you wearing it?  Here, let me….”  She seized the suit with the speed of one propelling a car crash victim’s gurney into Emergency.  “It might not be till tomorrow, okay, we don’t have much hot water.”

“That’ll be fine,” Crowley said graciously.

“You are too damn much,” Bobby muttered when Annette and the suit were gone.  Crowley beamed at him. “Let’s eat;  I don’t think Jax is gonna give us too much time.”

*

Jax sat in the main room of the clubhouse like a Viking chieftain receiving his subjects.  Any thought of a quiet private chat fled Bobby’s mind when he saw the crowded room and he sighed inwardly, hoping they weren’t going to be the night’s entertainment instead.  Without the Internet or even TV, people would be hungry for any kind of story from the night’s passing wanderers.

It wasn’t just the Sons and their hangers-on either.  Bobby saw quite a few townsmen and women with kids and even several older people – he mentally included himself – probably up to the age of mid-70s or so, who were also likely townsfolk here for refuge.

“Most folks stay here now,” Tig told Bobby, leading him and Crowley to seats opposite Jax.  _At least we’re not being shoved to our knees before the King,_   Bobby thought, glancing at Crowley, who he guessed had orchestrated that sort of scenario a few times.  “The rest of the town’s been mostly abandoned after some nasty critters moved in.  We tried to clear ‘em out, but turned out bullets couldn’t deal with all of them.”

“That would be right,” the hunter agreed drily.  “Give me what details you can and I’ll work out how they get dealt with.”

“I know there are vampires,” Tig said, suddenly quiet.  “We found folks sucked dry, just lyin’ in the main street.  But I got no idea what some of the others are.”

“I’ll look into it,” Bobby emphasised.  “It’s kind of my job.”

Jax, beer in hand, his blond hair in a shaggy mane that added even more to the Viking image, leaned forward a little as he heard this last.  “We could use your help,” he admitted.  “And we’ve got a recruit for you, maybe a couple more if you want them.”  Nearby, Bobby Munson raised his hand like a kid wanting the teacher’s attention. 

“I’ve been bored,” he said.  “No challenges in life these days.”

Bobby raised his eyebrows and Crowley snickered.

“I reckon we can help with that,”  the hunter said.  He looked back at Jax.  “I guess you want to know how come Fergus and I are back here on our own.”

“Get the man a beer,” Jax ordered, which Bobby took for a go ahead.  He accepted the tankard handed to him by the nearest biker and paused as he tried to decide how to tell what had happened.  These people knew about the supernatural world now, and the monsters it contained, but would they accept the actual Devil?  Well, only one way to find out.  “We were all together when we got to the town where the witches had gathered,” he said, glancing at Crowley to see how he was taking the version of their journey.  The demon’s face was expressionless and he sat back;  he was backing Bobby’s play then, at least for now.  “But we didn’t find them so much as get lured in,” the hunter continued, “and I say now that I’m sick at myself.  I should have known better.  It started with lettin’ Kyra head into that motel room ahead of us…”

When he got to the point at which he, Crowley and the Winchesters had gone outside, Bobby stopped.  He looked squarely at Jax.  “The rest I need to tell to you,” he said.  “Then you decide what everyone else needs to hear.”   There was a disappointed murmur from the crowd and Jax yelled for them to shut up.  They did.  Once more, Bobby wished he could bottle that ability.

“You got away,” Jax said. 

“We did,”  Bobby nodded.

“At least you two.  What happened in the rest of the six months you’ve been gone?   What about the other two guys?  And how did somebody get Kyra away without getting past you?   I never heard of a bathroom with a secret exit.”

“That’s all part of what we need to tell you.”

“Okay.  We’ll hold church.  Clear the room, folks.  Go do whatever you were doing before we had visitors.  You guys,”  and he nodded to two young men, with PROSPECT on their kuttes,  whom Bobby had not seen before, “you stay here and make sure nobody bothers us.”   Or listens in.  “Full members, follow me.”

There were fewer than Bobby remembered, though he was glad to know that Tig and Bobby Elvis were among the survivors.  He stood while the men seated themselves, Crowley silent beside him.  He had no chance to speak with him privately to ask what his view was on the matter and he couldn’t guess.  Would Crowley even care if the bikers knew he was a demon?  Bobby supposed he might, at least while he was cut off from Hellish support, but he was still a long way from powerless.

“First up,” Jax said, his voice showing more emotion than he had outside, “did you see or hear anything about my mother?”

“No,” Bobby said, glad for that at least.

“So what _did_ you see that you can’t tell everybody?  Because there’s not a lot left that would scare folks, you know?  They’ve lost pretty well everything, those folks out there.”

He sounded angry now and Bobby nodded.  “I know it’s sounding like we ran away,” he admitted.  _That’s because we did._   “But we couldn’t beat what was there.  Lucifer and his army were waiting for us.”

“The guy who thinks he’s the goddamned devil?” asked Tig, laughing.

Bobby looked at Crowley now.  “You tell it,” he said, seeing no other way.  “I’ve got nothing left.”

“We saw witches, we saw the people of that town,”  Crowley said, his voice low and raspy, yet precise, so that no one missed a word of what he said.  “They had all been possessed by demons called up by Lucifer.  It’s possible that Hell has been emptied;  I can’t be sure, since it has been quite a while since I was there, however you count time”.

“Everybody here’s goin’ to Hell,”  Bobby Munson said, as though it was only logical.  “But why’d you say you’ve already been, Fergus?”

Crowley’s eyes glowed red.  Even Bobby, who had been expecting that demonstration, was startled at the fierceness.  Usually the demon’s eyes would only flicker a little before he controlled the flares of red, now his eyes blazed and bled with it.  A couple of the bikers went for knives or guns.  Crowley looked at them and they froze mid lunge, while Jax was still shouting at them to sit down.  Then Crowley let them go.  Only Bobby suspected it was because he didn’t currently have the power to hold them.

“Because I rule it,” he answered Munson.  “Or I did.  Lucifer deposed me.”

“Far _out,”_ Tig breathed with what looked like sincere admiration.  “You mean you’re a fucking demon?”

“Come on,” Jax yelled.  “Sure, we’ve seen all kinds of weird shit and monsters.  But how are you going to prove something like that?”

“Robert?”  Crowley asked.  He met Bobby’s reluctant gaze.  “You know it has to be you.”

“They’ll believe I’m faking, not that you’ve possessed me!”

“Come on, do me,” Tig said eagerly.  “Should I do anything special?”

Even Crowley blinked with surprise at that.  Tig got to his feet, stepping back and spreading out his arms in an embracing gesture.  He was on the other side of the table from Crowley and Bobby, who looked at one another and then at Jax.

“Well come on, show us whatever,”  the Sons’ president said at last.  “Let the record show that Tig invited Fergus to do him, though.”   There was a general roar of laughter which cut off abruptly as Crowley collapsed to the floor like a puppet whose strings had been cut.  Everyone shouted at once as they saw the red smoke flow out of his eyes and mouth and straight at Tig, who laughed and waved it closer.  It shot into him and his long lean body rocked and shuddered.  Then it steadied and Tig’s voice spoke, with a seductive cadence the biker had never used.

“This is what happened to every human on the street in Winterridge, only those were demons with full connections to Hell and Lucifer-given powers to rend and burn.  Bobby and the others didn’t run away – I transported them, which I can’t do again right now.  Lucifer has cut me off from Hell and the effects of that would take too long to explain.” _You wouldn’t get it_ , his tone said.  “So I need to fuel up by spilling a bit of lifeblood.  Since I’m assuming no one wants to be sacrificed on the spot, that demonstration will have to wait.  I don’t know why only Bobby arrived with me.  Sam and Dean should have been here as well.  The travel should also have been instantaneous, but instead, you tell us six months have passed.  And as for what happened to Kyra;  a demon must have been waiting for her when she went into the bathroom.  We smelled its residue but it and she were long gone.”

“Tell us something Tig can’t know,” Jax spoke, his blue stare full of suspicion.  “Something Bobby can confirm.”

“You’d believe me?” Bobby demanded.

“My cell phone,”   Tig’s voice said, and his gesture towards the fallen meatsuit was all Crowley.  “Go find it, take a look at the images, the one called Kiss Kiss.  There’s a lovely image of dear Robert and myself in a clinch.  Picture number one.”

Jax pointed at Juice, the young Sons member with the tattooed and shaven head, who sat closest to where Crowley was.  Juice went over and patted the pockets of the jeans the demon’s favourite meatsuit was currently wearing until he came up with the phone and searched it.  When he found the picture, he grinned broadly at Bobby.  “What’s so bad about that?  You guys are screwing, what’s a photo of you kissing?”

Bobby was sure his face had to be scarlet.  “Because it – well, we weren’t doin’ anythin’ then and he was takin my soul….”

“Buying, darling.”

“You do deals?  That’s really a thing?”

“Shut the hell up,”  Jax growled at Juice.

“I was a Crossroads demon before I gave myself my promotion to King.  So yes, brokering sales of souls is what we do.”

“Fuck,”  Jax said after a long painful-looking few moments of thought.  “Give him back.”

Again the red smoke flowed out of Tig and he reeled, falling backwards to the floor.  A couple of bikers leaned over to look at their fallen comrade, who groaned softly, hand to his head.  “He’s okay,” someone reported.  Bobby knelt awkwardly beside Crowley, hoping he’d be able to stand up again.  He couldn’t see Tig now, but a few moments later heard the biker’s voice marvelling, “That was so fucking weird!  I mean, I was here, I could hear all of that but it was like my body didn’t belong to me anymore!  Meth has got _nothing_ on this.”

“He got a concussion?” Juice asked.

“No, that’s just Tig,”  Bobby Elvis answered.

“Tig, go see Tara and check you _don’t_ have a concussion,” Jax said. 

“Aw, come on, Jax….”

“Now.”

Reluctantly, Tig left the meeting room, grinning at Crowley as he passed him.  “We got to do that again, my man!” 

“Right,” Jax said, sounding half stunned.  He looked at Crowley, who settled himself in his seat as though it was his throne, Bobby thought, nodding graciously back to the biker president.  Bobby himself climbed awkwardly to his feet, shooting a look at Crowley.  _Wouldn’t have killed you to help me up._

“So about the rest of it, the time thing…”  Jax said.

“Jax, for us it’s been about three days,” Bobby said, when Crowley only glanced at him.  “Like Crowley said; the demonic transporting doesn’t take any time at all.  We don’t know why we ended up here, or why we took six months to teleport.”

“So who would know?”

“Angels,”  Crowley rasped.

“Yeah, of course,” Jax said, sounding resigned.  “It had to be fucking angels.”

“Actually,  they usually don’t…” Crowley began, then shrugged negligently.  “Not that that matters.  Unfortunately our best source of information is currently non-corporeal.  We tried to get him back, but Lucifer has got demons dogging him and there’s only one of me.  If we get him, we get them.  I have a few thoughts on how that may be, ah, circumvented but as you’ll now realise, a few things have got in the way of that progress.”

“What do you need?” Jax asked him.

Bobby admired the biker chief at that point.  Jax was well aware of his strengths and weaknesses;  he knew he and the others had no idea of how to deal with the apocalypse that had fallen on them.  If Crowley and Bobby knew a way, well, the bikers would see that that happened. 

“People to stop us getting interrupted,”  the demon said.  “Things will interrupt us when we start, be sure of that.  We’ll ward them as well as we can, but Lucifer owns this planet now and I’m not sure how we’ll any of that will work.  I can provide you with weapons which will take down demons.  We need backup that’s ready to kill anything that’s not us, or your own people.”

“We can do that,” Jax said.

“Good.  Then we have an agreement.”

Jax nodded.  “I need to discuss stuff with my brothers here now.”

Crowley got to his feet, brushing specks of dust off his dark plaid shirt as though it was his suit jacket.  “Well, it seems late and I’m sure Robert is tired, so I’m going to take him to bed and we will proceed tomorrow.”


	2. Give the Devil a Bad Day

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’ve just begun to watch season 13 of Supernatural; up to episode 6 as this chapter is posted. When I started writing this, I hadn’t seen any at all so came up with an entirely different predicament/retrieval method for Castiel. Anything in this is completely AU. Well, the presence of Bobby and Crowley should tell folk that much, but I just wanted to be clear. Castiel isn’t one of my favourite characters which is why he features only minimally in my stuff, but he was necessary here. One important difference is that I have Castiel’s vessel remain unburned, for crucial reasons. This chapter is also kind of long, but it felt better to keep it intact rather than separate it at a random point.  
> ___________________________________

Back in the small bedroom they’d been given, Bobby undressed slowly and got rather stiffly into bed, trying to decide how to start the conversation that had been rolling around in his head.  _We couldn’t get Cas back when we had Sam and Dean helping.  He had Knights of Hell hunting him.  That’s still gonna be the case, right?_   Also: _You’re still cut off from Hell so you need to fuel your power with lives.  Who are you going to kill here?  Are you going to kill someone here?_

Crowley took off the plaid shirt and jeans he’d been given like someone forced to handle several dead rats.  He looked good, Bobby admitted;  he always did, to Bobby, this side of his stay in heaven, even if he’d embarrassed shit out of Bobby by that last remark to Jax and the others. Yeah, he was kind of pudgy, but the way he carried himself was all confidence, with an admitted dash of arrogance.  His dragon tattoos were bright over his shoulders and chest as he turned to the bed.  Part of Bobby still wanted to strangle the bastard for some of his behavior, but he couldn’t separate that from just plain wanting him.  He gave Crowley a reluctant grin.

Crowley smiled back, slow, wicked, enthralling.  “Conversation now or later, darling?”

“You know what I wanta ask you.”

“No one you know.”

“What?”

“When we retrieve Castiel, I’ll aim not to kill anyone you know.  But I have to do it my way or it won’t get done.  You know that.”

“It might,”  Bobby said heavily,  “kill somebody I know.  Castiel said there were Knights of Hell on his tail.  If they show up here, you know the Sons will take them on, and you know what the outcome will be.  So yeah, it does feel like you’re askin’ me to approve you killing folks.”

Crowley’s amber eyes flashed red.  He put out the lantern, hanging from a nail in the wall, with a negligent click of his fingers, then moved to the bed and waited for Bobby to sigh and push the covers back so that he could get in.  He climbed on to Bobby, resting his body against him, his head just below Bobby’s and his hands on the hunter’s chest.  Despite his annoyance, Bobby settled his arms around him, rubbing lightly on Crowley’s back.

“I don’t ask for permission even from you, Robert.”

The last time they had been together was the last night Bobby had slept, which was a bit of a shock when he realised it.  After that was when time had stopped proceeding in any sort of logical way, so that he wasn’t sure just how long they’d been on the road before they reached Winterridge in South Dakota.  So was it 24 hours or six months?  Bobby’s head whirled.  He wanted to ask about that but it was one too many things to keep in the juggler’s ring of thoughts in his head. 

“But I’m happy to _give_ you permission, darling, to do whatever you like to me,”  Crowley drawled softly, his voice making Bobby shiver.  Then, not meaning to, he yawned deeply and then laughed, detecting an offended quality to Crowley’s sudden silence.

“Sorry.  Honest, I am, but I’m just too damn tired.  Too tired to argue with you and surely too tired for anything else.”  He patted Crowley’s back, the demon still lying on his chest.  Crowley sighed, letting go of his annoyance and shifted himself to Bobby’s side.  Given what Bobby had been through, he knew the hunter was entitled;  it was just so _frustrating_.

“Robert,” he said.

“What?” Bobby muttered at him.

“We can’t stay here in the clubhouse;  it’s a target.  We _make_ it a target.”

The hunter thought about that.  “Yeah.  I know.  Where then, the house?”

“I think the witches’ house might be more secure.”

“Rafael’s family home;  you want us to set up there?”

“Yes.”

 _I must be crazy._ Bobby could still remember what his life had been as the go-to guy for hunters, with half a dozen phones labelled with the identities he was supposed to be when he answered one of them.  These days, with super-security and all the things that could be done with the Internet, probably that method wouldn’t even work for hunters any more.  _Nobody’s gonna believe some guy on the phone who just_ says _he’s an FBI agent’s boss and yeah, we sent a couple of guys to check out your weird murder case._

He shifted a little, resettling himself against the warm, solid weight beside him.  _Oh yeah.  And I’m now sleepin’ with a male demon.  I guess all those hunters might be a bit funny about that.  I wonder if Sam and Dean told anybody.  Guess me being officially dead makes that a bit difficult.  And where are you guys anyway?_

“I can hear you thinking,”  Crowley said sleepily beside him. 

“Should put you to sleep fast then.”

Crowley chuckled softly and Bobby smiled in the dark, fully aware of how odd it was that the two of them could have such ordinary conversations.  He knew, because Crowley had told him, that the demon prized things like that.  Until Bobby, he’d never had it, in life or beyond life.  Bobby felt Crowley’s hand rubbing his shoulder gently, just an “I’m here.” 

“That house has protections on it,”  he mumbled, already sinking into sleep.  “Dunno if they can stop Knights, though, don’t know too many damn things.”

“You’re not normally defeatist, love.”

“I haven’t normally just lost my foster kid when all she did was run ahead of us into a bathroom!  And we don’t even have Castiel’s vessel here – he’s gonna have to retrieve it himself.”

“That’s why we need to hold up the demons on his tail long enough for him to get his head clear and his powers organised,” Crowley told him, ignoring the anger.

“You got a plan for that too, haven’t you?

A kiss then, Crowley shifting up to bend his head down to Bobby’s cheek.  _Yes._    And the scent of sulphur around him, reminding the hunter that whatever had happened to Crowley, he was not free of Hell.  Hell had sanctioned him;  it had not cut him free.  He wondered how aware the demon was of that, but did not want to ask him.  He ran a hand over Crowley’s bare, warm shoulder, feeling again that shiver of desire, making him wrap his arms around his demon and hold him as close as he could.  “Love you,” he mumbled, embarrassed at the words even here in the dark.  Heard the quiet intake of breath as though Crowley was surprised, then in lieu of words, Crowley’s lips once more against his bristly cheek.  _Hm.  Maybe I’m not that tired._

*

They moved to the Catalano house the next day.  Crowley made Bobby wait while he went over the threshold, a lit candle in his hand, and spoke several quiet words in Enochian which had a shivery, echoing effect around them.  _Strangers seek leave to pass, to do no harm, to hold and protect._    A witch’s house could guard itself against intruders, Crowley had told Bobby.  He had drawn on the fact that they had previously entered in Rafael’s company, using magic at a level Bobby knew he had never reached, to get them past the magical security.

They put their gear in the secret underground room the witches had used as a temple.  Bobby had wondered aloud how necessary this was.  “Says the man who built a panic room,”  Crowley had retorted.  “There’s old magic protecting this room – I don’t know what sigils they’ve carved because I haven’t found them yet but I can sense them.  No, they won’t keep Lucifer out – they won’t have been designed for that - but they _will_ stop anything short of him.”

That didn’t make the place comfortable, even with a mattress and bedding brought down from above.  They were strangers here, the only connection being that between the two kids – both now missing, of course – and Bobby didn’t feel that the house welcomed them.  Tolerated them was about it. 

“Bobby Elvis is coming over today, isn’t he?”

“Yeah, he said probably in an hour or so, give us time to get settled.”

*

Bobby Munson poked carefully around the temple room, not saying much, just taking it all in.  Bobby watched him for a time until he was sure that the biker was being both respectful and cautious, which he was.  He occasionally murmured under his breath, words which Bobby guessed were Jewish prayers of some sort.  Munson was not, precisely, a man of faith but he had been brought up so and thus had some protections, the hunter knew, against what Lucifer would bring.  If the old rules meant anything at all now.

Crowley would not care if they all died, saving his hunter, so long as the aim was achieved.  Of that, Bobby was certain and it did not sit well with him.  Finally Munson faced them.  “So what’s gonna happen here?  You want to bring this dude Cas back from the dead?”

“He’s not dead,”  Bobby told him.  Gods knew, this stuff was difficult enough for a demon and a hunter to get their heads around.   He didn’t want to keep things from Munson, exactly, but why make things more confusing?  “He’s kinda – well, his body’s here on Earth but his spirit’s elsewhere, like a ghost, except that he’s not dead…”

“You mean like in a coma?”

Bobby glanced over at Crowley, who shrugged and nodded;  that was close enough. 

“And you want to run a séance to bring his spirit back to his body, only there’s some bad shit gonna follow him back.”

“Exactly so,” Crowley approved.

“So where’s the dude now?”

“Not sure,”  Bobby admitted.  “But once we get his, ah, spirit back into this plane of existence, he can retrieve his body.  That part’s easy.  _If_ we can get rid of what’ll follow him out so he has the chance to do that before he gets, ah….”

“Smited?”  Munson asked.  “Old Testament shit.  Jews and Christians agree on that one;  the old-style God was a vengeful bastard.”  He grinned as though the idea didn’t actually bother him that much.

“Yeah,”  Bobby said.

“And this dude, you said – what, exactly?  He needs time to sort himself out once he gets here, but then he can take care of the bad stuff?  How’s that work out?”

“He’s an angel,”  Bobby said, seeing no way around it.  “And not the cute Hallmark crap kind either.  Angels….are bad news.  This one’s our friend and he’s got the juice to, if not take out Lucifer, at least give the Devil a bad day.  Give us a chance.  We get him back, we get rid of anyone following him and then he’s gonna be damn useful to us.”   He had not even tried to explain his and Crowley’s thoughts on where Kyra and Rafael might have ended up.  For one, they didn’t actually know for certain and for two, he thought Munson might have enough going around in his head right now.

“Angels and demons,”  Munson said, grinning at Crowley, who raised a dark brow at him.  “So why can’t you call up a host of Hell yourself?  I know you said it’s a divided house and all that, but if you were king, you gotta have buddies still in there who’d side with you for the sake of sharing once you win.”

“They don’t believe I’ll win,”  Crowley told him.  “And demons don’t have buddies.”

Munson shrugged.  “So forget buddies.  You must have guys – demons – who want a share of the loot you can hand out if you win.  Convince them the loot is worth it or that you’ll hurt them worse than the other guy if they don’t help.  Yeah, I know you’ve already done that, you must have done that.  But not enough.  And right now, what I get is that you want the Sons to hold the line against some fucking heavy duty shit.  You’re not a Son.  You don’t care if we live or die.  That’s all right, I get that.  I don’t exactly care if you do either;  no offence, Singer.  I want to help fix things, or repair what we can, because I don’t want to fucking die here.  But I’m not going into a fight I know I’ve got no chance in.  I know about this much about the sort of stuff you’re into.” 

He held his forefinger and thumb barely apart.  “The other Sons, they don’t know any of it.  Whatever comes out, they’ll try to shoot it and beat the shit out of it.  That’s all they know to do.  But they’re my brothers, man.  You got to convince me they got a chance.  You were talking about weapons that can take down demons – what the fuck does that even mean?  At the moment it’s like they’re naked and I’m not gonna go for that.”

For a long moment, he and Crowley stared at one another.  Then the King of Hell nodded, clear respect in his eyes as he studied the biker.  “Very well.  I _will_ shield anyone who assists us, but that may not be enough.  Know that.  And the last thing I can do is contact Hell.  They’ll only kill me.”

“Again,”  Bobby murmured softly, too quiet for the biker to hear, but Crowley nodded slightly to indicate that he had heard.

“They’re going to think you’re out of your trees,” Munson predicted.

Crowley shrugged.  “Bring at least two people.  Not Jax or anyone he’s going to need to coordinate his own defence at your base.”

“When?”

“Soon as you can.  Say by this evening.”

“You got it.” Munson headed for the stairs.

Bobby caught Crowley watching the biker’s broad rear as he left and gave him a stare.  Crowley shrugged, unrepentant.  “No problem with looking, is there, love?”

“Don’t let him catch you, is all,”  Bobby muttered. “So when are we gonna do this recovery ritual?”

“As soon as we can get the backup in place.”

Bobby studied him, unsure of whether to actually say it, then decided to hell with it.  “How much of a fool’s chance have we actually got, Crowley?”

“I don’t know,” the demon retorted.  “I heard Castiel say there were demons dogging him, same as you, and that they were Knights of Hell.  Is that actually so?  How am I supposed to know that?”

“But you still think anyone but you and me is cannon fodder, don’t you?”

Arguing with Crowley was never safe, but Bobby had never been interested in safe.  It made him feel alive, despite all the crap they were dealing with.  All the dread.  His fatigue had eased after a night’s rest and he’d even woken this morning hoping for a bit of R & R before getting back to the war….but Crowley was already at work, strengthening the wards of the house, meditating and planning how to orchestrate Castiel’s return and whatever else he happened to be plotting.

“I’ll do what I’ve promised, Robert.”

“I know.”

He crossed to Crowley, pulled him into his arms and hugged him;  actions which had to perplex Crowley, still, because no one did that to the King of Hell.  Had done that.  Bobby closed his eyes, aware of that faint sting of sulphur which clung to Crowley, always a reminder of what he was.  But being that, he was already more than any demon ever had been,  Bobby told himself.  He had listened to Bobby Elvis just now and more, he’d conceded the point.  “It’s only partway through the afternoon,” he noted.  “We got a bit of time before Munson gets back with the recruits.”

“And?”

“Not like you to miss a bit of innuendo.”

“Oh.  I _see_ , darling.”

“Come on, you idjit.” 

*

Bobby Elvis had one of the Prospects and what looked like one of the younger townsmen with him when he returned.  They were a bit whites-of-the-eyes but he’d evidently prepared them.  When Bobby asked whether they’d been told magic was involved, he thought they’d laugh or start asking dumb questions but they only nodded.  “Okay then.  Crowley here and me, we have to do the séance part.  We’re going to call the spirit of our friend Cas back, the guy who’s, uh, lying in a coma.  But when it comes back, there’s going to be….monsters followin’ it.  Now, I do not want anybody here to be a hero or to get so crazy he just runs in to get killed.”

“This isn’t a big room, man,”  the Prospect noted.  “Anything comes through the door, it’s gonna be right there with us.”

“Uh, it won’t be through the door to the stairs,”  Bobby said.  “Remember, séance?  We’re gonna call the spirit back into that pentagram marked on the floor.”

He had drawn physical lines with marker pens on the wood, mentally apologising to the homeowners as he did so.  Above those, he had scattered the salt – that not being one of Crowley’s tasks, as the demon had put it – around most of the area, leaving a gap maybe a foot long.   “We’re gonna call Cas through.  Get him into the outer room.  Close the salt barrier.  That will, we _hope_ , give him time to re-establish himself and retrieve his vessel before what follows him is able to break out.”

“You’re not filling me with confidence here,”  Bobby Elvis muttered.  He toyed with the pistol at his side, though Bobby had already told him it would be useless.

Crowley, keeping a careful distance from the salt, only shook his head.

*

They were under way.

It felt good, in a weird sense, to be doing what he was meant to be doing, being a hunter, even if his partner in crime was a demon and they were enacting a ritual in the temple below a witches’ house.  _And who’d have seen that coming?_    Lit candles marked the edge of the circle, chasing shadows into the corners, and the air seemed to grow heavier as Crowley chanted.  Bobby supposed if this was a movie, he and Crowley would be in robes with esoteric symbols painted on them, but he was just in a clean t-shirt and jeans and Crowley in his suit – returned absolutely immaculate by Annette – as they calmed their minds and set them upon the work.

Crowley moved to him, put his hands on the hunter’s shoulders and urged him silently to bend his head, which he did.  Crowley kissed him – part of the ritual, he’d said, but Bobby was sure it wasn’t normally this, ah, enthusiastic – and Bobby returned it, feeling the demon press against him as he did so.  “Ease up,” he muttered, “we got company.”

Crowley laughed and called out the Enochian words.  Bobby gave the responses, needing to be prompted by the demon a couple of times.  Damn, he used to be able to remember heaps more than this, even all hot and bothered thanks to Crowley.  They  faced the pentagram, both taking care to stay clear of the lines.  Crowley had set Bobby Elvis and the other two to stand at three of the corners.  Bobby himself stood at the fourth and Crowley before the altar.

He heard a crackling sound, as though the wind beyond the house was physically in the room with them, bringing with it storms.

“Do you feel that?”  Bobby began to ask, but Crowley shook his head fiercely, began to move his hand to wave the hunter back.

The altar – no, the air _above_ the altar – exploded into burning light.

A hundred voices screamed inside Bobby Singer’s head. His bones seemed to melt to nothing and he was on the floor before he knew it.  An ocean roared in his ears,  Those voices screamed in wordless despair.  That was how it sounded.  And Crowley’s voice shouting syllables in that demonic language that seemed to grab hold of Bobby’s innards and pull them out.

He retched and fell.  Hours passed, or moments.   Someone screamed and then there was a pure cacophony of screaming and blows and agonised gasps for breath.  Bobby forced his eyes open and saw them, three dark shapes with glowing eyes, facing the defenders from within the pentagram cage.   He couldn’t tell whether Castiel’s spirit was present or whether he was clear of the trap, but he fumbled to spill the salt over the escape chute, as he thought of it.  Whether Cas was clear or not, the demons were _here._

A roar deafened Bobby and he felt himself falling, helpless, a thousand miles to the ground.

“I am here!”

And that snarl, louder than a dozen jet engines, was the fury of an angel.   Bobby glimpsed the spreading of the huge wings, greater than could possibly fit in this space, and the deadly bloom of light before throwing his forearm in front of his eyes.  _Castiel._    That was “fear not” shit, right there.

He smelled the iron stink of blood.  It was what woke him.  He was sprawled on the hard floor, people on their feet above him, unable to make out who they were until he got the whiff of sulphur and saw Crowley kneeling, his bearded face only inches from Bobby’s eyes.  “Are you all right, love?”

“Yeah – yeah, not even scratched.  Was I hallucinating – is he really here?”

“My vessel seems to be unusually stiff,” said a familiar gravelly voice.

“Oh yes,”  Crowley drawled, “he’s here.  _And_ his suit.”

Bobby rubbed his eyes gently.  He was hugely relieved to find outlines beginning to appear and take recognisable form.  The explosion of light had been so great that he felt he should be looking at the charred remains of the house around them, but as he sat up carefully, he noted that it seemed to be intact.   Standing next to Crowley, looking as clueless as ever in his messy trenchcoat, was Castiel in his familiar vessel, looking from face to face.  Bobby Munson was sprawled on the ground, groaning and swearing as he tried to get up.  There was no sign of either of the assistants he’d brought with him.  Or, thankfully, of the demons.

“There’s an odd smell too,” Castiel obliviously informed his rescuers.

“That’s you, Feathers,”  Crowley told him.  “I don’t suppose anyone changed the clothes on your vessel or washed it while you’ve been away.  Deplorable, really.  If I’m ever not using this meatsuit, I insist on it receiving proper maintenance while I’m gone.  Massages.  Skin oils….”

“Can we concentrate on what’s goin’ on?”  Bobby demanded.  “I gather the demons are gone – what happened?  Who’s hurt?”   He reached a hand to Crowley, demanding to be assisted, and the demon hauled him to his feet.  He then assisted Munson, only then realising that the biker had blood splattered liberally over him.  “Are you hurt?”

“It’s not my blood,”  Munson growled.  “Where are the others?”

 Bobby spun around to survey the room, although he knew.  Munson was coated in more blood than a man could survive losing, but that was the only sign of the two other humans who had been here.

“Did those things _eat_ them?”  the biker asked, dabbing ineffectually at his face. 

Bobby didn’t answer him.  Instead he studied Castiel, saw him whole and powerful as though he had never been harmed, never had his essence banished into…wherever it was he had really been.  Even in his human vessel, he glowed, barely containing the overflowing power.  From Castiel, he looked to Crowley and saw, with a sinking feeling, that the demon was not surprised.  Finally, he turned back to the Son of Anarchy.

“Bobby Elvis,”  he began at last.  “I’m sorry, I….”

The biker ignored him and stared at Castiel as though no one else was there.  “You this “angel” they went to rescue?”  he asked.  “The guy who’s supposed to save the fricking world?  Two of my buddies just died to save you, man.  I hope you’re worth it.”  He walked slowly across the temple, scuffing the salt as he went, and began to ascend the stairs, not acknowledging Bobby or Crowley as he left.

“Well?”  Bobby asked the demon.  “What did you do?  Exactly, please, what the fuck did you do?”

“There was a spell on those two which, when they were killed, funnelled their life energy to Castiel so that he could teleport to his vessel and bring it back here,”  Crowley said in a monotone.  “I shielded Bobby Elvis as promised.”

“But not the others.  You lied.”

“Yes, I lied.  A salt barrier was never going to hold them.  I don’t know if they were Knights of Hell powerful, but they were _fucking_ powerful, Robert.”

“You fuelled my Grace with life sacrifices, Crowley?”  It didn’t help that Castiel sounded appalled.

“Takes him awhile but he gets there,” Bobby growled.  He took a step towards Crowley, emotions roiling in him so that he could not have said himself what they were for sure.  Then he drove his fist into the demon’s face, the force knocking Crowley down.  Bobby stood looking down at him, knowing that if Crowley chose to retaliate, it wasn’t going to matter whether he was on his feet or not.  But no answering blow came.

“You wanted this done,”  the demon said, enunciating as clearly as he could through a clearly damaged jaw, “it was never going to be pretty or even acceptable, Robert.  It had to be done as a demon would do it and you are well aware, if you stop wading in the goddamned river of Egypt.  You are the only being on either side of the veil whom I would take this for, but even for you, I will allow only so much.”  That red flash in his eyes came again, gone when Crowley blinked deliberately.  “Now I have, and Castiel has, enough juice to take the next step, which is for you to go where Kyra is.  Feathers, you’re up.”

Castiel stayed out of punching range of Bobby, which the hunter decided grimly was one of the few signs of common sense the angel had ever shown.  Or else he was now so full to the brim with life force or grace or whatever he wanted to call it that Bobby was about a second away from a good smiting.  “Well?” he demanded.  “What do you know?”

“She’s in another shade of this world,”  Castiel told him. “I’m not sure I can pull you out, if I send you there.” He sounded as casual as though they were continuing a conversation without the break of violent murder. 

“Let me worry about that, cupcake,” Crowley interrupted as he got to his feet and began to dust himself down.  “Robert, just answer me this;  are you ready to go to the place where Kyra is?”

“Is that a serious question?” Bobby muttered.  The pounding in his head was worse, he felt actively nauseous now and figured he was about due for a migraine.  Having gotten the angel here, he now wanted him to just go _away_ and let him talk to Crowley.  Something was wrong, something wasn’t adding up and he couldn’t think, damn it.  “What does that mean, a shade of this world?”

“She’s in a dimension without magic, love,”  Crowley said.  “That’s why Castiel is saying anyone who goes there needs somebody damn high powered to get them back, because once there, they can’t…”

“Don’t call me that.  Not right now.”

Crowley eyed him.  Was that wariness in his expression?

“Well, yes.  Castiel can put you there but he’s not sure he can get you back.”

“I got that part.  But what about you, aren’t you coming with me?”

“Castiel and I have to team up against Lucifer.  I hate to admit it, Robert, but neither of us can win against him alone.  He’s going to talk to his people, I’m going to talk to my people – whichever of them are still loyal – and we’re going to take Lucifer off the board.  I don’t want you on the battlefield when it goes down.  If you can find Kyra, you can protect her and then we can work on getting both of you home.”

The thrumming in his head was louder.  Bobby looked around confusedly but the noise didn’t seem to be emanating from his surroundings.  His senses were thick with sulphur and dread, his hands bloody from touching Bobby Elvis’s jacket.  Castiel was still standing there in his stupid trenchcoat with half the buttons off his shirt.  “You’re doing something now,” the hunter said thickly.  “You’re just going ahead with whatever and it don’t matter what I think or what I want, so long as your play brings you out ahead.”

“I’m doing what I need to do, Robert, always and ever what I need to do.  But it’s not just for me.  I haven’t been entirely forthcoming with you, that’s true.  Castiel and I have been in contact since our last play at getting him and his vessel reunited, and we’ve set up passage for you to this….other place where you’ll find Kyra.  But there is….no…time!”

“Crowley….”

Crowley didn’t move or touch him, but Bobby felt himself pushed backwards, like an ordinary physical shove powerful enough to make him release Crowley’s shoulders and take a step back, then another.  And in the moment of taking that second step, he was somewhere else and the night time scene of death and chaos was gone.

He stood in sunlight and warmth, with greenery before his eyes.  Alone.


	3. The Shining Man

_Six months earlier_

_Bobby hardly spared a glance for the room;  the usual dull furnishings, this time in brown and yellow, containing two double beds and a single.  He dropped his duffel bag on one of the beds and began sorting out what he needed for a warding, while Kyra immediately ran for the bathroom._

_From_ This Is Not Our Fate

 

Kyra banged the door shut, calling “Dibs!”  as she did so, giggling to herself as she heard Dean calling, “Hey, that’s not fair!

Then she looked up and froze where she was.  She wanted to shriek but her vocal cords weren’t working.

There was a nun in full habit standing beside the shower.

Kyra’s mind kept urging her to call for help, but she could only stare at the woman, who was maybe around Bobby’s age and smiled kindly at her, right up until her eyes flashed demonic black and the smile turned to a cruel smirk.  Then she reached out and gripped Kyra’s nearest hand so hard that the girl was sure she felt bones crack.

She opened her mouth to try again to scream.

The bathroom was not there.

She stood in some kind of crowded office with a wooden plank floor and a strange man standing in front of her, wearing jeans and a t-shirt.  He was tall, maybe around Dean Winchester’s height, with untidy blond hair and an ordinary sort of face, the kind which could easily fool people into thinking he was “nice.”  He was smiling at her in a friendly way, like he knew her, though she had never seen this face.  And then that eerie red flared in his eyes, just for a moment but deliberately.  His smile widened as he observed her fear.  She let the scream out, then, a sort of thin whisper,  but the nun had already dropped her hand and moved away, bowing her head humbly to the man.

“Oh, get out of here, Bruce, you look damn silly in that meatsuit,”  the man drawled, rolling his eyes as though to share the joke with Kyra.  It was the cadence of the voice which told her, identified the being she had met the other times in stolen flesh.  The voice which froze right inside her.  “So good to see you back, sweetheart,”  he added to her.” “My second best vessel!   Of course, this one here won’t degrade, but you never know when an accident’s gonna happen or you just feel like a change of scenery!”

“I won’t….” she gasped.

The nun’s body fell empty to the floor and Kyra jumped, letting out a louder shriek as she saw the black mist rising out of it and disappearing, like a mutated swarm of bees.

“Oh, you will, sweetheart,”  Lucifer assured Kyra.  “If I happen to need you, that is.  I just know there are things you’d say yes for, aren’t there?  But lucky for you I don’t need you for that at the moment, now I’ve got access to Hell once more and my demons are behaving like they should, so I’ve got this body back again.  Which isn’t to say I can’t _use_ you, because of course I can.  I’ve even arranged for some nice ladies to take care of you.   Now, where are the bitches?  Rowena?   Gemma!”

Kyra shrank back against the shelving behind her as two figures entered the office.  One was a stranger to her, a red-haired woman in a long velvet gown, like some medieval cosplayer, but she knew the other and stared at her in disbelief.  This was Jax Teller’s mother, Gemma, whom she’d only met on that first night, because she had gone missing right after that.   Bobby had said something about her being a witch, about Jax finding a Book of Shadows in her room.

“I told you, I’m not here for child care,”  the redhead snapped, in a gorgeous Scottish accent that Kyra would have loved to listen to, had she not been in the position of being kidnapped by the Devil. 

“You’ll help Gemma take care of this child,”  Lucifer said, shooting her a barely-amused glance.  “Because she’s useful to me and so she’s important to you.  Or I can toss you out at your son’s feet and he can do what he likes with you.  I don’t think he’s too happy with you now, Rowena.  You didn’t even cry when you heard he was dead.”

“He’s _not_ dead, you said, so why would I waste any more time on him?” Rowena demanded.

“This is the girl in the prophecy you mentioned?”  Gemma asked, ignoring Rowena.  “The one supposed to finally take you out, and not in a fun way, hm?”  Her predatory stare at Kyra made Kyra wish Gemma would shrug her off the way Rowena had.

“Right,”  Lucifer said, clearly tired of the discussion.  “Also the strongest vessel I have access to, if I want to switch from my number one suit here.  _And_ something that’s going to bring in the Winchesters and Crowley.”  He tapped his chest, beaming broadly again.  “So take her out of here and lock her up, you know the drill.  She’s not to interact with any of the townsfolk or my other, um, guests.  Be nice.  Or at least don’t torture her.”

*

She said she wanted to sleep, to get them to go away, but when they were gone, leaving her in a plain little room which looked like it had been a storage area, Kyra sat up on the bed to look out of the window.  There was a concreted area below, maybe a car park or courtyard, with a few cars parked at the edges.  She could just see a road past a barrier, maybe a security post.  She was teetering on the edge of blind panic and a desperate hope that somehow Crowley could get to her.

She hadn’t been comfortable with him, at first.  At all.  He wasn’t like Bobby, who felt dependable and _sure_ and fully human.  You felt safe with Bobby, even when things weren’t at all safe.  Crowley was part of that chaos, part of the terrible magic which had crashed into her life.  He was a demon, one of those who had worked for Lucifer.  Had _served_ him, that was the word. 

Over the months in the bunker and then the time in Charming before everything fell, she had begun to change her view of the King of Hell.  The way he had understood that her mother was no longer in that shell attached to hospital machines.  His willingness to talk to her, as blunt as if she was an adult, that had begun to win her to him.  And then there’d been the talks in Charming while Bobby was away working or investigating the town, after she’d met Rafael but before they broke up for the summer holidays.  Well, what would have been the summer holidays.  That strange day when the snow fell;  that had been the beginning of chaos.

“Are we okay now?”  she had asked Crowley one afternoon after school, coming to lean around the doorway to the spare bedroom, which he’d set up as a kind of lab for magic stuff.  It was easier, she’d found, thinking of him like he was some kind of mad scientist, than a witch.  He’d corrected her at great length when she called him a “warlock” once.  Bobby had found the whole thing hilarious.

“Context, darling,” the demon murmured, his eyes on the pestle before him in which he was grinding something.  “Come in or go out, you’re like a cat that can’t make up its mind.  I always think cats are such pestilent beasts.”

“I mean, now we’re all here in Charming in our own place,” Kyra said, used to his manner by now.  “The Shining Man.  He’s not….still looking for us, is he?”

“Kyra,”  Crowley said, quiet but quite audible, “you’ve had him inside your head.  He has existed for all of human time and is infinitely vengeful, while also being incredibly petty and subject to distractions.  What do you think?

“I don’t know,” she said, beginning to regret the question.  That so often happened when you talked with Crowley.  She watched him and he raised his eyes, amber with sunlight, totally confident. 

“We’re not here to escape Lucifer, sweetheart,” he said, tipping the contents of the pestle into a bag that looked like polished leather.  “Bobby would have lost his sanity in that bunker with Sam and Dean rattling around all the time and I assure you, I’d have been screaming alongside him.”  She managed a faint grin at that image. 

“Bobby said we needed our own place.”

“And so we do,”  Crowley agreed.

“What happens when Lucifer…..notices us again?”

Crowley sighed.  “Not something I care to dwell upon.” He set the bag down, looking at her thoughtfully.  Kyra crossed her arms and looked back.

“Bobby won’t talk to me about him,” she said.  “Well, I mean, he will but it’s just telling me we’re being careful and you’re both watching out.”

“We are,” agreed Crowley, who knew just how much work Bobby had put into the protective wardings around the house and the close eye both of them kept on Kyra when she was elsewhere.  But when it concerned any actions they could take when Lucifer had time to spare for them again, that, the hunter was not facing.  Perhaps no human could.  He walked around the desk and stopped again, just beyond arm’s reach.  “So, you would like to consider what happens beyond that?”

Kyra shivered, an instinctive motion of her whole body, like a deer wanting to flee but unable to.  “I know _he_ has to ask,”  she said very quietly.  “He did before;  he told me it would save my mother, because him possessing her was….you know.”   Crowley nodded.  “I’m scared he’ll say it’ll save Bobby.  And you.”

“Me?”  Crowley blinked, clearly startled.  “Darling, don’t ever consider a deal with him to save me.  For one, it wouldn’t work.  He’d be able to work around any deal he made with you, trust me.”

“Because I’m a kid.”

“That’s right,”  Crowley agreed.  “And because you’re human and he’s a thing that has been festering in the pit for millenia and before that, he was an angel.  He would also hold it over me abominably and I’m not willing to put up with that.  But Bobby is another matter.”  He stood, very still now, watching her.  “We can set up a failsafe.  You won’t be able to tell Bobby.  If you do, Lucifer will be able to extract the details from him as easily as shelling peas.  It will also involve you actually agreeing to whatever deal Lucifer puts on you.  And he’s likely to do that if he can, you know that.  You know a lot of information he’d like to know, and the way he’d learn it would be to…”

“Get inside me.”

“Yes.”

“But if he could get it from Bobby, he could get it from me.  When he was in me the last time, he knew everything I knew.”

“Not if we set up a little room in your mind,”  Crowley told her.  “We’ll put the knowledge in there and close the door.  You won’t be able to open it.  Only I will.  And it’s very unlikely he’ll think to ask me about it.”

“But he might.”

“He might and then it fails, darling.  It’s a lot harder for him to get knowledge from my mind, but he can do it, he’s the creator of demons.  But without us doing anything, one day Lucifer will remember us and come for us and then…”   He snapped his fingers and she jumped, then steadied and looked back at him again.  Crowley nodded his approval.

“There’s a spell,”  he said.  “It allows you to revoke a permission given for possession.  Even with him riding you and walking around in your body and speaking with your voice, you’re still _there_ , aren’t you?”   She shivered with the memory and nodded back.  “And you’ll wait to trigger that spell until Bobby and I are in the room with Lucifer, when there’s no other human present and/or alive.  You’ll wait until I give you the countersign, because until I do, you won’t remember how to activate the spell.  You’ll know there was something, but Lucifer is going to believe that’s pure random, stupid hope that you can get the jump on him, because you humans are just that dumb.”

“But there’s always someone he can take,”  Kyra said in a low voice.  “He told me.”

“We will make sure there isn’t.  His arrogance will play against him.  It always does.  It got him booted from heaven.  You’d need to leave what follows up to me.”

“Isn’t there anything else we could do?  I hate keeping a secret from Bobby.”

The demon regarded the human girl looking back at him.  His mind filled with terrible potentials, he shook his head.  “But, sweetheart?   Lucifer would have to go through Bobby _and_ me to get to you and we’re scary.  Well, I’m scary and Bobby can yell very loudly.”  She couldn’t hold back a grin at that and he smiled.

Three weeks later, snow fell on a summer day and the world collapsed.

*

On the first night Kyra was Lucifer’s prisoner, the demons sacrificed one of the townsfolk in the area beyond her window.  They tied the person to a stake and then set fire to the wood piled around them.  She pressed her fingers in her ears and pulled a blanket over her head to shut out the screams.  That didn’t work. The next night, there was another, and another beyond that.  She learned they weren’t actually from the town;  Lucifer’s demons scouted beyond its fringes and brought people in.   Some of their captives were police officers who had been searching for those taken before them.   In the new reality, the townsfolk accepted that, since it was not them paying the price.

Kyra thought people would go crazy and riot but instead the silence of the town became steadily heavier and more ominous.   The only beings she saw moving around were demons, in the bodies of witches, having access to their powers as well as whatever they’d had as demons.   The blood magic made them as powerful as Crowley, who had learned magic on his own, slowly and painfully over his centuries. 

So Rowena and Gemma told her.

She had another shock when she discovered that neither of them was demon-possessed.  Gemma _had_ been.  She’d been walked out of her home and brought here – not explaining how or why - whereupon the “Dark Father” had restored her to herself.  She told Kyra this with a little roll of her eyes, as though sharing a joke, but the girl hadn’t dared to react to that.  And Rowena, who seemed so nice, turned out to be….

“Fergus’s _mother_ , girlie,”  she’d trilled.  “Can you imagine;  all these years and when I meet my boy again, he’s the King of Hell?  I was so proud!  But of course he had no time for me, he threw me out of his so-important presence and wouldn’t take my calls.”

“He hates being called Fergus,”  Kyra said.  At that, she saw a glint of coldness behind Rowena’s eyes that made her want to run for her life.  Gemma was surface threat and meanness and plotting, but that was a level Kyra could understand.  Rowena, a witch four hundred years old, had bought that life with constant murder/sacrifice and wouldn’t even twitch over adding Kyra to that list.  She had begun, in her fully human days, by abandoning her eight year old son, Fergus, to a life of workhouses and deprivation.

“Sweetie, you may think you know him,” Rowena drawled, “but it’s obvious that you haven’t a clue.  He was a miserable failure as a child and a man and a worse one as a demon.  It was pathetic, really, watching him scurry along after those ridiculous Winchester boys.  I thought when he sacrificed himself for them;  well, he finally got something right, but he didn’t, did he?”

_Don’t cry.  She’s only trying to make you cry.  She wouldn’t care about doing the right thing anyway._

Honestly, these grown women were nothing more than middle school bullies;  just just the Mean Girls grown bigger and older.  Kyra blinked the starting tears away and stared stonily at nothing, running her mantra over and over in her head.  _He’ll help me.  They will, Crowley and Bobby.  They will find me._

So she passed the days as well as she could, reading whatever books they would give her, trying to exercise by skipping and doing situps and keeping her mind as active as she could by mentally going over whatever lessons she could remember from school.  School, though, was fading from her reality as she got closer to fourteen.  She even talked with Gemma and Rowena as much as she could, just because they were the only people who talked to her.  Lucifer ignored her.  She was no more than bait to him, she knew.    When it amused her, Rowena could even be decent company.  And she knew a mean remedy for period pain.  Three cycles passed.


	4. Shade of this World

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Supernatural is full of impossible coincidences; research that’s too easy, characters that find each other over incredible distances, too-fast travel, deaths that don’t last and magic that utilises never-before-mentioned rare artefacts that somehow fall into the hands of the characters. So I think I can get away with having portal-creation be both more random and easier to achieve than canon has it. My take is that once the first portal between worlds was opened, it created instability in all the creations and thereafter, portals could happen rather like earthquakes. E.g., my OC Rafael (the kid, not the archangel!) is sucked into one by being too close to it when it opened. 
> 
> I'm sorry for the long delay in posting. I was moving house. I also decided some of what I'd written after this was crap and so need to rewrite!
> 
> ***************************************************

It had been a week in an alien world.  Bobby had been dropped in with no more than what he was wearing and what he’d had in his pockets.  His wallet had contained some cash, enough to pay for a room in a boarding house situated in the worst part of town, maybe half an hour’s hike from the rundown city park in which he had appeared.  He didn’t need to know the place to see that.  Some guys had tried to mug him on that very first evening, as he roamed aimlessly, getting more and more anxious.  Bobby sliced one of them with the blade he’d been carrying in one pocket and both took off, not willing to push things with prey that fought back.

The coastal Californian town was called Stockton and whether it resembled the one in his own world, Bobby couldn’t say, never having set eyes on it before the apocalypse swept through the area.  He did learn, through apparently casual conversations with the other men at the boarding house, that there was no gang called Sons of Anarchy _or_ the Mayans hereabouts.  Or a town called Charming, for that matter.

He watched the news in the boarding place’s common room and learned that the US President was a blond, intense woman called Hilary, currently loudly defending her “First Husband” Bill who was in trouble about some girl.  Bobby thought that this world looked even more war torn and chaotic than his own.  It was as though the lack of monsters meant humans spent even more time attacking each other.  If he hadn’t known it was impossible, he’d have been sure that Crowley’s sales teams had been hard at work here.

At night, he lay in a narrow creaky bed in a tiny room that stank of cigarettes and sweat and piss, staring up at the ceiling, while men in rooms to either side snored quite audibly through thin weatherboard walls.  He wasn’t exactly short of stuff to rerun in his head, but now all he could see was himself punching Crowley and the demon knocked to his knees and _not_ blasting Bobby to bits.  Still calling him _love_ and going right on with his damned plans.

 _You should be here,_   Bobby thought.  _What the hell am I meant to do here?  I got no resources, nothing._

And on the seventh night, frustrated and unsure of where he could go next to ask about a missing teenager, he walked around the block to clear his head a little.  He was standing at the traffic lights when someone fell out of the sky and nearly knocked him into the stream of cars.

It was Crowley.

Bobby grabbed him, muttering incoherently as he swung Crowley away from the road.  The demon didn’t fight him;  he looked dazed and sick and there was blood on his face, so Bobby stopped moving him in case he threw up.  Could demons vomit?  In the next moment, Crowley fell to his hands and knees and answered that question comprehensively.  Bobby glanced around to be sure they were alone and waited until Crowley seemed to be done, before giving him a hand up.

“What the fuck is going on?”  he demanded.  “Thought you weren’t gonna be in this.  I’ve had no word from Cas or you or any leads in the entire week I’ve been here!”

“A week?” Crowley asked, sounding shaky.  He drew in his breath.  “I feel quite strange, Robert.”

 “C’mon, let’s get inside.”

The other occupants of the boarding house studied Crowley with open curiosity as Bobby shepherded him past the open door of the common room.  Though his black suit had suffered a bit of recent dishevelment, he still looked an exceedingly curious and formal figure, straightening his tie as he smirked back at them.  When Bobby closed the door to the room, Crowley gave it a disparaging look before settling himself on the one battered chair, which creaked warningly.

“Wouldn’t sit on that,” Bobby said belatedly.

“Even for you, this is a bit on the rough side, isn’t it?”

“Can you keep your voice down?  Everybody out there’s gonna think you’re a booty call.”

“Later, darling,”  Crowley said, but he did lower his voice a little.  He studied Bobby carefully, his gaze dwelling on the unfamiliar blue check shirt the other man wore. [Five dollars from the house’s Lost and Found collection, bargain, only missing one button!]  “Did I hear you correctly?  You’ve been here a week?”

“Yeah, a week today.  I tried talking to the local cops but somehow, a man in his sixties tryin’ to find a young teenage girl not related to him didn’t impress them too much, especially when they couldn’t find any record of me at the address on that fake driver’s licence…”

“Robert, you remember that spell I performed, that brought me back, thanks to the link I created to you?”

“Yeah, of course,” Bobby said.

“Well, it’s still working, love.”   Crowley’s eyes seemed hooded, his expression troubled.  “You weren’t gone five minutes before it pulled me after you.”

Now Bobby stared at him, at the damp patches on his suit which still smelled of spilt blood and iron, the just-come-from-battle look of him, the messed dark hair and beard.  That was from Bobby punching him, a week ago for the hunter, but Crowley didn’t even have a bruise on his face yet.  For Bobby, that incoherent fury had faded to a kind of resigned anger and embarrassment.  He started to mumble an apology, but Crowley waved it away.

“I don’t doubt you,”  Crowley added.  “Even if I did, you’re in different clothes and you’ve had enough time to find this….abode.”

“You can call it a dive,” Bobby sighed.  “Everybody else does.”   He seated himself on the side of the bed, the only other place to sit and now held his arms awkwardly out to Crowley, who looked bemused for a moment and then shifted himself to sit next to Bobby, who carefully embraced him and hugged him hard.  Crowley’s face was pushed into Bobby’s chest and all the air crushed out of him and he did not mind in the least.  “Don’t ever do that to me again, idjit.”

“I’m not sure I’ll be able to, love.”  

“This world don’t have magic, so maybe you’re not a demon here,”  Bobby suggested.  “Is that what you mean;  you’re not sure you’ll be able to do this again?”

“With me here and Castiel back home, it’s up to him to do the working to get us back and he already told me he’s not sure he can.  He thought he might need to rustle up an archangel and they’re not all that keen on helping, as a rule.  So, darling, whether we find Kyra or not, it’s very possible that we’re stuck here.”

Bobby was silent as he held him.  A lot of his tension had gone, he noted;  seemed that the simple fact of having Crowley here with him had fixed that.  He wasn’t one to dwell on airy-fairy stuff like soulmates or any of that crap, especially considering who _his_ soulmate appeared to be, but the cast-adrift feelings had abated.  Also, Crowley was damn smart and conspiring was a way of life to him.  Between them, surely they would do better at tracking the kid.   He stroked Crowley’s hair, a touch awkwardly, then something occurred to him as his hand touched the demon’s bearded cheek.  “You, uh, you don’t feel hot like you did before…”

“Well, thank you, Robert.”

“No, idjit!  I don’t mean like you’re not hot, I mean you don’t _feel_ hot…your body temperature always seemed...”  Bobby trailed off, sighing as Crowley snickered.  “I’m just diggin’ my own grave here, aren’t I?  I haven’t been sleeping more’n a few hours a night.  Let’s get some rest, unless you need something to eat, and in the morning we can get going.”

“I don’t think I could keep anything down,” Crowley admitted with some distaste.

“Didn’t think demons chucked up like that.”

“We don’t.  We don’t usually need to _eat._ ”

“You can hang your gear up in the cupboard, there’s plenty of room.  I only got the couple of changes.”

Not long after, Bobby switched out the light and settled down in the bed as best he could.  There really wasn’t room for two, even with Crowley practically lying on him, not that he minded that.  He must really be feeling sick, the hunter thought, not to be making any moves.  _But I got him here with me and nothing matters besides that.  Even if he didn’t plan to be here._   For awhile he dozed in the warm dark, his arms around Crowley and the demon cuddled close as he could.

*

They moved.  After two nights in the boarding house, Crowley was insistent on that.  When Bobby asked him how the hell they were going to afford to rent the new place Crowley took them to see, the demon reached into his coat and pulled out a wad of bills.  “I always carry a bit of cash with me, darling.  The money here is the same color as at home and nobody ever looks at the pictures on it.”

Bobby spluttered as he followed Crowley into the building.  _“Bit_ of cash!””  Inside the apartment, he looked around the living room of the place.  It looked okay to him.  Working hot water, electricity.  Neighbors not in evidence, so hopefully they kept to themselves.  Private.  He adjusted his pants surreptitiously at that thought.  Even if he did have a lot else to be concerned with, he still thought about it.  So sue him.

“We need to get online to search for Kyra,”  Crowley said.  “We talked about codes, signs to use.  She knows what to do.”

“You talked about what to do if we were separated?”  Bobby questioned and the demon nodded.  The agent came back in at that point, looking inquiringly at them.

“We’ll take it,” Crowley told her and the woman bustled about organising the papers.  _How does he do that?  He can’t use his mojo here, can he?_   Bobby wondered, trying not to roll his eyes.  _She’s practically sittin’ at his feet and beggin’.”_  Better not to ask, he knew.  “So, darling,”  Crowley said to him once she was gone, “where’s the best place to obtain a computer?”

*

“Why are you so stunned I know my way around a public library?”  Bobby growled softly to the demon as Crowley pulled up a second chair beside the workstation.  “You’ve seen my library often enough.  And this is the fastest way to search, trust me.  I’ve been here most days, keyin’ in anything that might relate to Kyra.”  He gave Crowley a stare with just enough ice in it that the demon raised his eyebrows and sat back, palms up.

“Sorry, darling.  I just wasn’t planning on being quite this public.”   He glanced around at the students and backpackers surrounding them in the computer area;  not a separate room but part of the huge main area of the building.  Library users wove their paths around them constantly and there was a soft burr of voices, volume vigilantly enforced by the librarians.

Bobby sighed deeply.  “Save it.  So why’d you ask to go online?”

“I may have set up some codewords with Kyra which we could use in the event of our separation.”

“That you didn’t tell me?”

“At the time I didn’t expect we’d end up in different worlds!”

“Right, right.  So what codewords?”

“Girl Scout Demon.”

“God.”  Bobby sighed and typed it in.  “This is probably gonna take us to all kind of kinky shit.  You didn’t actually talk to her about, you know, kinky stuff?  Please tell me you didn’t.”

“Absolutely not.  That would be very inappropriate.”

“Huh.  You’re tellin’ me.  All right.”   He studied the listings.  “None of this looks like anything to do with Kyra.  C’mon, you sit here and look through this.  I’m gonna grab another computer;  I need to get a proper idea of where we are so I’ve been reading through this world’s history.  It’s even more screwed up than ours, but at least it don’t seem to be headed for apocalypse that soon.”

He jumped, some unknown time later, feeling Crowley’s hand brush his shoulder. “The library is closing in five minutes,” the demon said, surprisingly gentle.  ‘We need to go.

They were doing _something_.  Even though they hadn’t found her yet, not a sign, Bobby felt his hopes lift that little bit.  Walking beside Crowley to the library doors, he glanced at him, found him for the moment looking ahead and unaware.  He looked so much….like _Crowley_ ,  Bobby admitted to himself.  That damn black suit, with the silver paisley tie, as spruced up and elegant as possible given the circumstances, the short beard which Crowley was so careful to keep trimmed.  The last few library patrons were also leaving, but Bobby could only blame himself for what he did next.  He said, “Hey,” and when Crowley turned, quickly kissed his cheek, witnesses and all. 

“What’s that for, love?”  Crowley murmured, shoulder against his, as they exited into the summer night.

“I just felt good,”  Bobby confessed.

“Kissing me makes you feel as though you’re good?” Crowley teased, his tone making Bobby feel he shared Bobby’s sense of hope.

“No, you idjit.”

“That’s more like it.  Come on, let’s go back to the apartment and I’ll make you feel better.”

*

The next week wasn’t easy, but a huge improvement on the first, Bobby thought.  Everything around them was different, not _very_ different but enough that they had to work hard not to stand out.  Crowley, after a particularly pleading and insistent request from Bobby, finally agreed to dress down, which to him meant leaving off the tie and wearing t-shirts with his jacket and trousers.  They stayed home except when they had somewhere specific to go and/or research which turned out to mean the public library.  It was close by, there was a coffee shop and Bobby admitted he felt better being around the books.

And, yeah, they went to bed together, which euphemism always made Crowley snicker.  At the back of his mind was always a voice whispering to Bobby of damnation, of leaving go of all the principles he had ever held dear, of the immediate and terrible danger to his mortal soul.  He knew that.  But if he had any comfort in all this, it was from Crowley, and it was more than just physical pleasure and the closeness.  At some point they’d gone past the game-playing and the point scoring and all the way to looking out for one another, as a true demon would never do.  Whatever scheme Crowley had to get Lucifer and recover his power – and Bobby had no doubt he had one – this was genuine too.

He’d woken once from nightmare – some terrifyingly vivid scenario where he’d been trapped in Hell but couldn’t find Crowley, and the demons had tortured him while he was crying out their King’s name.  Crowley himself had held Bobby in his arms firmly while he talked him awake, a sweaty mess, probably about as sexy as a broken down truck.  “They wouldn’t stop,”  the hunter told him confusedly.  “I was beggin’ them to find you and they jes’ laughed.”

“That’s what demons do, love,”  Crowley agreed. 

“You don’t.”

“Don’t spread that sort of thing around, Robert, it’ll get me a good name and we can’t have that.”  He sighed, running a hand down Bobby’s back.  “It wasn’t a premonition, darling, it was just a bad dream.”

“You weren’t going to come here,”  Bobby muttered.

“No.  Because I could have done better on the other side working to get you back.  Castiel will get distracted by other things.  For instance, his priority will be tracking down Sam and Dean first, and if Lucifer isn’t hunting them, he will be soon.”

Bobby had fallen asleep again eventually. 

Back in the library, working side by side on the public terminals;  that felt surprisingly comfortable to Bobby and, he thought, to Crowley also.  Mostly they were reading news stories, sometimes travel accounts, or politics, anything to form a jigsaw impression of this world.  They scanned the social media, with much smirking on Crowley’s part and muttering on Bobby’s, but there was no response to any of the word-bait Crowley threw out.

The hunter jumped when he felt a touch on his shoulder.  Of course it was Crowley, giving him a quizzical, brows-raised stare.  “Come on, Robert, time to take a break.”

Bobby checked the time; they’d been working for several hours.  “Didn’t even notice,”  he muttered.

“Come on,”  Crowley repeated.  “Coffee.”

“You don’t even drink coffee.”

“You need some.”

Duly supplied, Bobby stretched and sat down on one of the park benches outside Stockton’s library.  Summer weather, not too hot, people moving about like they had not a care.

“Wonder if there’s another me somewhere here,” Bobby yawned.

“There’s an actor who plays you.”

“How do you know that?”

“Dean told me.”

“Uh, no offence, but why would he tell you?”

“Remember the story of his time as a demon?  Trust me, Robert, he was happy to tell me anything I wanted to hear, especially when he was drunk.  He and Sam visited this place, before you saw the pearly gates…or my hellfire, for that matter.  There’s a television show about two brothers who hunt supernatural creatures.  Both of us are characters on that show, though it ended after Castiel was killed…calm down, Robert, I mean the actor playing him was killed.  You had to know that was coming.  Chaos does rather follow the Winchesters around.”

He was talking quietly, close up, but Bobby still cast a wary look around to make sure no strangers were listening in.  “Can’t deny that.  So what happened to the actors playin’ Dean and Sam while the real Dean and Sam were here?”

“I don’t know; perhaps Dean never found out.  It’s possible they spent time in our world.  I wasn’t around them then to know, so perhaps they just spent a few extremely befuddled days looking at one another in a motel room.”

“So our actors could be there now?”

“I suppose we’ll find out.  But not before we do what we’re here for.”

“If we ever get any sort of lead.  You know, I wonder what it’d be like just stayin’ here.”

“Are you serious?”

“Sure.”  Bobby yawned but otherwise didn’t seem about to settle back to sleep.  “You and me are a damn sight more equal here.  You can’t work magic – though you do have all that centuries of time behind you;  all the magic you know.”  His voice, rumbling quietly so that only Crowley could hear, filled that emptiness in the erstwhile demon’s mind.  “So maybe we can’t ever be properly equal, unless I get to live that long which I don’t think’s gonna happen.  But you know, if we can’t get back – if we can just find Kyra – wouldn’t be the end of everythin’ to me if we made a life here.”

Crowley, startled, reflected that considering the situation “at home,”  the prospect really wasn’t entirely awful.  No magic here meant no effective pursuit by any supernatural foe, including the Prince of Lies himself.  Of course, Bobby wouldn’t ever see Sam or Dean again, but that might be the case anyway if the Winchestesr had just been tossed somewhere random in the world.  Or somewhen.  _It began with the seasons going wrong,_ he thought, thinking of that summer snowfall, _and then time got shaky.  It wasn’t just that I didn’t fix on a destination.  Lucifer has been messing around with the rules of daddy’s creation.  But if we don’t go back, I’m stuck as a human in an ageing, achy, shitting meatsuit that’s become my actual body._

“Let’s worry about that later, Robert.”

“I intend to,”  Bobby sighed.  “Just wanted to say it.  You know, I was adding up how long she must have been here, given when the demon took her – though I guess we can’t be sure what happened after that and how the hell she got away from Lucifer – and it must be more’n half a year, since we lost that time somehow when you teleported us.  Then a day for you became a week for me, so add at least another month to that….”  He looked a little warily at his companion.  “You can’t think of anythin’ else we can try, can you?”

“Demonic solutions, Robert?  Not going to punch me again, are you?”

“You had it coming,”   Bobby growled, but he shook his head.  “No, not gonna mess up a hair in your beard, I swear.  What have you got in mind?”


	5. Kyra Through The Looking Glass

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is purely about Kyra and her experiences while separated from Bobby and Crowley.

 

_[Three months earlier]_

“Wake up, girlie.”

Rowena’s voice, rolling the ‘r’s by her ear, quiet and compelling.  Kyra opened her eyes.  The witch stood by her bed, dressed all in black, like an old-time movie villain, maybe from Disney, with a light suspended from nothing, glowing in a ball above her head.  To make things completely weird, she had Lucifer’s nephilim child in her arms.  Kyra couldn’t help it;  she glanced past Rowena, just a quick flicker of her eyes, then unwillingly back at the kid.  The little boy stared back at her, unsmiling, exactly as though he knew who she was.

“Lucifer isn’t here,”  Rowena said, mouth twisting in amused understanding.  “He doesn’t know _I’m_ here, or about quite a bit of the extracurricular study I’ve been doing.  So get up and get dressed.  You’re leaving.”

“Are you letting me go?” Kyra demanded, grabbing her jeans which lay on a nearby chair.  The sleep shirt she was already wearing would do.

“Not exactly, girlie;  if I did that, he’d just scoop you up before you’d run three steps.  No – you’re going to test how well I’ve learned a new spell.  If you survive, I’ll know, and that’s going to be useful when Lucifer gets bored with having the Queen of the Grand Coven on a string, now that he’s got almost all of the witches as vessels for his demons.  If you don’t survive, well, I’ll think of something else.”

“So what are you doing?”  Her head felt heavy with sleep and confusion.

“A doorway’s going to open in front of you and you’re going to jump through it,” Rowena said.  “I know you’ve seen a portal before.  A random one opened in front of you and that boy you told us about and it dragged him in.  This one will put you in another version of this world, understand?  Somewhere Lucifer can’t get at you.”

“So I’m going where Rafael is?”

“I don’t know.”   She glanced at the baby in her arms, a steady stare that made Kyra think suddenly that it wasn’t just random that Rowena had brought him along with her.  Even if he’d been crying, she’d have left the quieting to somebody else.  The witch flicked a sudden look to her that made her think of Crowley; the “I’m so clever” smirk he did sometimes.  “Your boyfriend isn’t my focus, though give him a few years and he’ll be quite the cutie, I’m sure.  But I know more than I did before, lassie.  Junior here is my ticket out – and yours – if I’m correct and I do believe I am.  Nephilim are special things, angel and human in one package.  They don’t belong fully above _or_ below, so I began wondering how well they could move sideways, if you understand me.”

“Not really,” Kyra admitted,  her mind still half awake.  Even if she’d been alert, she didn’t think what Rowena was saying would make much sense. 

The witch sighed dramatically.  “Well, that doesn’t matter now.  Listen carefully;  once I start my working, this boy is going to start making a lot of noise and _that_ means you will have seconds.  I’m going to try to get you where Bobby and Fergus are, and you need to get them back on Lucifer’s trail soonest.”

“And get you out,” Kyra said.  She stared dubiously at the baby.  He was one creepy little kid, but she didn’t like the idea of any kid being at the mercies of Rowena and Lucifer, not that they had any mercies, which was kind of the point. “What about Sam and Dean;  do you know where they are?”

“No, or I’d most likely port you towards them.  Sam would never leave a damsel in distress,”  Rowena declared, rolling her eyes.  “Dean, well, you never know, but Sam will get him in line.”

Kyra was very careful not to react to that one, because what she wanted most to do, despite the situation, was giggle.

A moment later, the desire to laugh left her, right when Rowena produced a small, very sharp knife – testing it on her thumb, it drew an immediate welling red line – and then did the same on the baby’s arm.  “Hey!”  Kyra hissed, at the same time as the child let out an indignant wail.

“Special things,”  Rowena said, ignoring both of them.  She held the infant so that a single drop fell from the tiny wound on its arm, right into the witch’s palm.  Even as Kyra made a futile grab – to do what, rescue the kid? – Rowena slapped that palm against her forehead, smearing the blood on her as she raised her voice in a sequence of words that hurt the ears to listen to.  “Move!”  she ordered Kyra.

“Where?”

“ _Behind_ you, idiot lassie.”

She turned and the world was roiling in a blurred circle of wind and darkness, blocking out the view of the room beyond.  Something was pulling her towards it, just as though she was clinging to a ceiling and gravity was sucking her down.  Rowena stared avidly into it and when Kyra still hesitated, extended the arm not clutching the crying baby and gave her a hard push.

Kyra staggered.  And called out as she did, “But _why_ are you helping me?”

“I’m not _helping_ you, child.  But you could say this is me paying back my son.  It was never right between us, never will be….”

“Rafael,” Kyra said to herself.  “Bobby.  Crowley.”  She let the push propel her into the whirlwind.  In that same moment she heard a roar behind her, which also sounded like wind, but also like a human voice raised in fury.  Lucifer was aware.  Lucifer was………..gone.  So was Rowena and the room and the world.

#

Car and truck horns blared furiously and light blazed into Kyra’s eyes as she staggered, feet on a hard surface, trying to see and keep her footing at the same time.

Kyra stood in hot sunlight, vehicle noise and stink everywhere, the scream of metal assaulting her ears.  She was in the centre of a busy crossroads – a small, frizzy-haired figure in a too-large sleepshirt with sunflowers on a blue background - staring numbly at the vehicle in front of her whose terrified driver had managed to halt it only arm’s length away.  Human yelling was added to the noise then as people jumped out of the cars to converge upon her.  Then two police – recognisable even though the uniforms didn’t look quite right to her – pushed through the growing crowd.  Kyra got ready to tell the best story she had ever come up with in a childhood filled with the constant need to dodge authority, topped by several months coaching from the King of Hell.

_Let’s see if it’ll be good enough._

The police each took one of her arms and hauled her firmly to the side of the road.  She didn’t protest, partly because she was still half numb with shock, and partly because she couldn’t see it doing any good.  They made her sit in the police car and then the female officer sat beside her, asking gentle but insistent questions.

“What’s your name, miss?”

“Kyra Singer.”

“What’s your home address?”

“I don’t remember.”

“What were you doing in the middle of the road?”

“I don’t know.”

“We need to talk to your parent or guardian – do you have your mother or father’s phone number?”

“I feel sick,”  Kyra said.  _Delay answers till you know the score_ ,  Bobby had taught her.  _You can’t lie effectively until you know what you need to lie about_ ,  Crowley had added.  The officer talked to her colleague and then he got into the driver’s seat.

“We’re taking you to the nearest hospital,”  he told Kyra.  “Hopefully we can get a family member to meet you there.  You get any details out of her, Carter?”

“Not yet,”  Officer Carter answered.

Cops aren’t meant to question you without a parent or guardian present,  Bobby had said, but not all of them will keep to it.  _Yeah, but what do I do when it’s not even the same world?_

She sorted through the scenarios she and Crowley had discussed and had decided on her next move by the time they pulled up at the hospital and the two officers passed her into the custody of a doctor.  Kyra continued to claim that her head hurt – not even a lie – and that she couldn’t remember who she should contact.  She knew they wouldn’t keep her at the hospital long and that the next step would be their version of Child Protective Services.

On the way she saw enough street signs to tell her that this town was Stockton, the big town nearest to Charming, an undamaged, summer season Stockton with no visible monsters.  If Rowena hadn’t told her, Kyra would have known something was amiss just by the very normal appearance of the town.  For some reason, the witch had chosen to send her close to her last home, or perhaps it was that Kyra herself had put her own stamp on the witch’s direction spell.

The police officers disappeared from Kyra’s life – she hoped – and she found herself in a curtained cubicle in Emergency, looking at the considering face of Dr Lia Nguyen, who examined her briskly but quite gently.  Kyra did her best to sound sincere but confused, sticking as close to the truth as possible.  More advice from both Bobby and Crowley there.  _Just don’t pretend to be an agent for the FBI;  it’s not gonna work for you_ ,  the hunter had added, followed by rasping laughter from the demon.  Thinking of them brought her dangerously close to tears. 

“Did you remember something?” Dr Nguyen asked, watching her closely.  “You seem upset now.  We will take care of you, don’t worry, and the police are already looking for your parents.”

She hadn’t turned a hair when Kyra had told her the almost-truth there, giving Bobby’s real name and giving Fergus McLeod for Crowley.  It didn’t matter, did it, whether this doctor approved or not.  The cops weren’t going to find a couple by those names.  Even if they’d been in this reality, they were off the grid and if there was one thing both hunter and demon knew, it was how not to be found.

“Just as well you didn’t pull this walk into the traffic trick in LA, that’s all,”  the doctor mused.  “They wouldn’t have had _time_ to see you and maybe wouldn’t have stopped then.  Your folks can’t be far, surely.  Perhaps you were travelling;  do you think that’s the case?”

Kyra nearly fell into the trap of agreeing with the doctor’s so quiet, reasonable suggestions, but stopped herself in time.  “I wish I could remember,”  she said.

Nguyen nodded, still studying her.  “You won’t be staying in the hospital,” she said.  “Somebody will be here soon and take you to a hostel for foster kids, just until the police find your parents.”

Being a kid,  Kyra thought bitterly, was the worst thing _ever_.   Nobody let you do anything.  Well, after being kidnapped by the Devil and held prisoner for months, being a kid was the worst thing.

It was several hours later that the woman from Child Protective Services showed up and took Kyra away with her. 

#

“So, then, it worked,”  Lucifer said, once he was done with those roars of triumphant and dramatic laughter.  “My boy can open portals.”

Rowena wondered whether all up themselves supernatural beings had this urge to declaim the bleeding obvious.

“His blood in the spell ratchets the power up several notches,”  she agreed.  “Obviously there’s a limit as to how often you can do the spell.”  Lucifer stared at her and the witch had to bear down to stop herself rolling her eyes.  “Or he’ll run out of blood,”  she added meaningfully.  “Did you happen to find dear Gemma?”

“She’s taken off,”  Lucifer growled.  “I must have fried ten demons for not guarding her properly.  Doesn’t matter.  I was bored with her anyway.”

_Well.  Not so all powerful are you, laddie?  I’m not so sure Gemma’s plan has any chance, but we’re certainly going to find out._

_Her son is loyal._

“But now you’ve lost the girl,”  she dared to remind Lucifer.  “I thought you wanted her as bait for Fergus and his hunter lover.  Or do you mean to skip over into this other world and fetch her back?  You _could_ , so long as I’m here holding the portal open for you.”

_Just in case you decide you’re bored with me as well, now that I’ve done the hard yards for you._

“And perhaps I will, when I need her.”

“If she moves from the exact spot where she landed – and chances are she will, My Lord – you won’t know where she’s gone and my tracking spells won’t work over there.”

“I’ll find her when I need her,”  Lucifer growled.  “I have other things to work out, like getting into Heaven.  Those feathered budgies have barred the gates, would you believe?  No one in, no one out, and it’s going to take every demon I have to break them….and I don’t care if that breaks every demon!”   He stalked out of the room and only then did Rowena dare to exhale slowly in relief.  

#

She was too old for any chance of adoption.  Not that the Child Protective Services people came out and _said_ that, but it was pretty obvious to Kyra.  She was clearly adolescent, not a child any more and it was rare that any children beyond toddler age did get adopted into families.  Her refusal to tell anyone anything else but her name and age “didn’t do you any favours,”  she was told.  

They shunted her into a group home in Stockton with a dozen other teenagers and a couple of tired staff with way too much to do.  It was noisy, it was tense, there was constant fighting because there was never enough of anything, someone else was always in the bathroom (one for boys, one for girls), the traffic noise blared constantly from the main road right next to them….and Kyra knew it might be home for a long time.

She could be in the holding pattern for five years, until she turned eighteen and they would cut her loose.  She took it calmly;  that apparent lack of emotion bothered the CPS people.  She knew because she heard them talking;  more of Bobby and Crowley’s lessons about listening to people unseen.  At night, though, she couldn’t stop thinking about the hunter and the demon and how what was happening was in no way what they had all planned.  Any separation was supposed to only be days or weeks.  Not even Crowley had considered years.  Or always.

 _Next goal,_ he’d said.  _Yes, you have to think ahead but you have to consider the near future the most.  What do you next need, so that that further future can happen?_

Trust.

They needed to trust her, to believe she was one of the “good”  kids.  She needed them to stop watching her every moment for lapses or dangerous behaviour.

She needed computer privileges.

It took about six weeks of painfully good behaviour and extremely boring life for this to happen.  Jeff, one of the group home “parents,”   warned her at length that privileges could be taken away if she abused them.  She must stay within the parameters of Internet use for her age.  Kyra looked at him, so earnest and well meaning, and wondered what he’d say if she told him about her past.  Even the non-supernatural parts of it.  He couldn’t do the job he did and be unaware, could he?

She just promised.

After that, there was about the same length of time behaving on the computer, not visiting any forbidden or likely-to-be-forbidden sites.  Playing kiddie video games, reading blogs of other teens, trying to find out just how different this world was.  She read some news sites – funny how those were never flagged as too violent or with sexual references or any of the other things that could make Jeff and the others spit their chips.  Since she’d never paid much attention to general news anyway, this wasn’t a lot of help. 

Kyra imagined Bobby’s disapproving look if she admitted to him she wasn’t sure who the President was.  She was sure this one was someone different, since she didn’t remember a lady ever being president, but she wasn’t _dead_ sure.  Not with all the apocalypse stuff that had been going on.  It wasn’t always easy to get time on the home’s two computers that were allocated to the kids.  Everyone was supposed to sign up for time but in practice, that didn’t work so well.

Kyra had just started her time, a full month after getting the permission, when two of the older boys;  Justin and David, blustered in, yelling and laughing.  The other comp was being used by three girls, so Justin and David homed in on Kyra.  “C’mon, move,”   Justin said as though it was a natural conclusion.  “We need this machine.”

“I’ve got it until two o’clock,”  Kyra said, not taking her hands from the keyboard.

“You can have it after us.  Move it.”

“After I finish, it’s Khadija’s turn,”   Kyra said, still not looking at them.  With peripheral vision, though, she saw Justin’s hand coming in to push her shoulder.  Bobby’s lessons clicked through her mind.  She swivelled the chair, clear of the hand, then _moved_ , now on her feet between comp, chair and boys.  Justin’s momentum made him stagger forward, now there was nothing to hit.  David laughed at him and his face flushed with anger.  Fist raised, he started at Kyra.

Neither of the house parents were around and none of the kids in the room were likely to stop anything.  It was up to her.  She waited, focused, until the angry teenager threw his punch and then sidestepped, just enough, grabbed his arm and pulled him past her, sending him stumbling awkwardly and falling to the ground.  Kyra didn’t go after him.  She adjusted her footing and again waited.

“ Dude, leave her alone,”   David said as Justin got painfully to his feet.  “You’re gonna bust us off privileges.”

That seemed to save face enough and the boys left without looking at her.  The trio on the other computer whispered and giggled but they didn’t talk to her either.  Kyra resumed her seat.  She was uneasy about putting herself out there, as it were.  In this world, she _had_ no digital footprint, as Sam had described the concept.  Here – well, she’d looked for herself and there was just nothing.  It was creepy.

So here was her new Facebook account, bare bones, since she wasn’t supposed to remember much.  She knew that the carers would be looking at it;  it had to look just like what they expected and so the message had to pass unnoticed, except by the people it was aimed at.  There were quite a few other Kyra Singers, so she had to include the code message somehow.

Crowley was indifferent to computers and his advice had of necessity been kind of vague.  He had simply said that Lucifer, or any supernatural creature, would have ways to search that had nothing to do with any human creation, but be careful what she said all the same.

Bobby was pretty good with computers but in a research/practical kind of way.  Having an online presence wasn’t something he thought was necessary or even a good idea. 

After thinking and deleting and writing again, she thought she had it, mixed up with the fake data in her profile.  “ _I’m back in my home town again after a long time away.  I’ve been kind of sick and I don’t remember a lot of things, but I know I used to live near here.  I’m in the foster system but the place is okay.  Too many kids, of course.  I hope all the time that things will work out and that I can find my family.  I keep trying to remember things and little bits come back to me now and then.  Like I know I used to be in Girl Scouts and I think my dad, or someone in my family, was a hunter._

That was two of the code words.  Try as she might, Kyra couldn’t think of a way to slip in the word “demon”  but she was sure they’d ID her from that anyway.   She jumped suddenly at a light touch on her shoulder and found a dark-skinned girl of about fifteen, wearing a hijab.  “Oh, sorry, Khadija, I’m over time, aren’t I?”

“ It’s all right,”  Khadija assured her.  “Are you okay?”

“Just thinking.  All yours.”

But Kyra went no further than one of the armchairs around the big coffee table strewn with magazines, picking one up as an excuse.  She glanced up at one point to see David, Justin behind him, lurking in the doorway, and gave them an innocent smile.  They faded out.  _Message received,_   Kyra thought, smirking to herself. _You don’t mess with me or with anybody else._

#

She got answers to her post quickly.

Kyra hadn’t expected that and she read them with desperate hope….realising in moments that none of the answers were from Bobby or Crowley or anyone she knew.  Most of the posts seemed to be from people who wanted to tell her what they’d like to do with a Girl Scout.

She was still staring at them trying to decide what to do, when yells from the hall had her on her feet.  She hurried to see what was going on along with the person on the other computer; a quiet boy named Ryan who had never given her any trouble. 

Two of the girls were laying into one another with shrieks and enthusiasm…and very little actual contact.  Kyra stared at them in disgust.  What use was hair pulling and shrieking when you fought?  She was about to go back to the comp when she realised that Justin had pushed past her and jumped into the seat.  “Hey, it’s still my time!”  she yelled.  “Don’t you read that!”

Too late.  Justin let out a bark of laughter and raised his voice. “Hey, guys, Kyra’s talking porn with some man online!”

That was all it took, of course.  She was marched into Jeff’s office for a lecture.

Even if she hadn’t answered, she’d been reading the messages and hadn’t reported it to anyone. 

“When was I supposed to do that?”  Kyra demanded.  “While Rosa and Britney were yanking each other’s hair out, two minutes after I read it?”

Jeff marked her down for disrespectful language as well as questionable conduct.

There went her computer privileges for another month.

Kyra caught Justin in the back garden a day later and managed to land a kick where he really hadn’t wanted it to land.  He was too humiliated to report it and just muttered when the house parents and other kids asked why he was walking like something was fragile.  It felt good, but it didn’t help, of course.

She broke bounds and went to the nearby library to try to access her account there.   One of the other kids saw her leave and reported it, no doubt hoping to win privileges of her own.  Kyra had been on a library comp for less than a minute before Margaret, the other house parent, appeared by her side.

“It won’t work,”   she said.  She was a tall, skinny black woman, in brightly coloured clothes, whom Kyra thought she would have liked in other circumstances.  She didn’t preach the way Jeff did;  she talked to you like you were a person.  Solemn, resigned, a this-is-just-the-way-it-works tone.  “You had permission from your guardians – for now that’s me and Jeff – to use the house computers.  You don’t know the passwords to access this machine.  Come on, let’s get back.”

“Who told on me?”

“You know I can’t tell you that, girl.”

Kyra stayed put, desperate.  “Please.  Will you look at my Facebook page for me, tell me if – if anyone called Bobby or Fergus has left a message?”

“Jeff said strange men were messaging you about something you wrote,”  Margaret said.  Impossible to tell what she thought about that.  “I don’t know any of the names.”

“These aren’t strange men _.”   Well…..not like you mean_.  “They’re my foster parents and I need to find them.”

“Records say you don’t remember what happened before the police found you and you got moved over to us.”   Margaret gestured with her hand, not touching her, and Kyra got slowly to her feet.  “The hospital passed on everything you said and I know there wasn’t anything about foster parents.  If you were already in the system, it would have shown up.  You have to know that.”

_Not if they’re from another Earth._

“Just look, please.”

“Come on.  If you come back without any fuss now, nobody else needs to know.  I’ll buy you an icecream on the way, because I could do with one myself.”  After the icecream, when they were at the door of the group home, Margaret said quietly, “Jeff got your page taken down.  Thought you’d better know now.  Somebody’s going to be watching, any time you play online, Kyra.”

_They don’t know where I am.  There’s no reason they should ever come looking for me here.  It was stupid thinking they would.  They know about portals but they don’t know about the one Rowena made….or where it went.  No one but her could know that._

Why hadn’t she just run as far as she could?   Sick to her stomach, Kyra went to the room she shared with three other girls – all currently elsewhere – and lay down on the bed they’d given her.  The very next chance she had, she decided, she would simply run.


	6. Phoning Home

 

“Come out?”  Bobby repeated as though Crowley had spoken an alien language.  “Come out of where?”  He was beginning to wish he’d insisted on getting the whole story when the demon first raised it;  not had dinner and begun preparing for bed.  But Crowley was right;  he _had_ been feeling drained, not remembering to eat, even, till Crowley told him to.

“Out of the closet, love,”  the other man said as patiently as he could.  He sat on the bed in his boxers, waiting as Bobby slowly undressed.  Not that he minded the view, but it was surely the world’s most leisurely strip tease and a chap could get grey hair waiting for that to finish.  “Remember how you said the police reacted when you asked about Kyra?”

“Well, yeah, it was like they thought I was a criminal,”  Bobby grumbled, sniffing his shirt and deciding it could manage another day.  He put it over the back of a chair and Crowley rolled his eyes.

“So, if a nice same sex couple came to ask about their missing foster child, that might improve things?”  he prompted.

Bobby’s eyes widened in horror.  He turned on Crowley, who merely smiled pleasantly up at him.  “The closet – you mean telling the police I’m a damn pansy?”

“Robert.  Singer.  _Get down here_.”   Crowley seized his hand and tugged hard.  He instinctively tried to add demonic strength to it and winced as this didn’t happen.  Bobby resisted the pull for a moment and then sat down heavily next to him.  “What do you think you and I have been doing, hmm?   Certain activities don’t make us _pansies –_ honestly, what decade do you mentally occupy – but they do imply we’re somewhat, mm, non-conventional, wouldn’t you agree?  And how important is your precious machismo in the scheme of things?   It could persuade the police that we are honestly and legitimately concerned, enough so that they will use the network which we lack in this world, and track her down.”

He studied Bobby’s face, saw the conflict.  “I never thought I’d mention your boys as any kind of example for conduct, but surely it’s worth just heading in there and seeing if this works, hmm?

“No,” Bobby corrected morosely, “they head into trouble and _then_ maybe come up with a plan.”  He managed a rusty sort of smile.  “So we’re still ahead as tacticians.  Okay.  Let’s do it.”  He drew in a resigned breath.  “What am I gonna have to do?”

#

He still couldn’t quite believe it.

Bobby glanced at Crowley beside him in the police station, busy smiling and talking earnestly to the police officer from Missing Persons.  He was still mostly the Crowley Bobby knew, in black shirt and trousers, but he’d subtly….altered things.  Instead of the usual silver paisley tie, Crowley was wearing a pale purple women’s scarf he’d found in a charity clothing store.  He’d brushed his hair differently, managing to give a definite effeminate vibe, though usually he seemed nothing of the sort.  Even his gestures were more girly,  Bobby had to call it.

And what he’d done to Bobby….. The hunter was used to adopting personas, to maybe putting on a suit and shaving carefully around his beard, but now he was wearing a long-sleeved white cotton shirt with little pink flowers all over it, ostensibly a men’s style, but the pattern horrified Bobby.  He’d been allowed to keep his own jeans, but the belt threaded around his waist had pink thread picked out around the black leather.  Crowley had also invaded his shaving privacy and supervised the most careful shave Bobby had ever had, neatening and reducing his beard as well.  He had put cologne on him, the same that he was wearing himself.

And the plan was working.  The cops were listening.

#

“Why does it bother you?”   Crowley asked, businesslike, as they left the station.  He sounded his normal self again, if Bobby could call it that, so long as he didn’t look at him.  He didn’t have to ask what Crowley thought bothered him.

“Havin’  them think I’m, you know.”   He sighed, glanced at Crowley’s face, finding the demon studying him quietly.  “I know I sound crazy.  I mean, we _are_ \- I just don’t like anyone knowing my personal business.  And I _don’t_ like sticking a label on myself.  I’m with you.  I’m not interested in other  – other people.  I made my peace a long time ago now with how I felt about you.  What it means.  Like when I die - again - I’m probably gonna be in Hell because Heaven will have changed the locks.”

“I’ll be there,”  Crowley said. “When you die.”

“I know.  But you don’t know….what you’ll be able to do.  And even though my memory won’t hold details of Heaven or Hell, I know I’ve been in both of ‘em.  I wish I couldn’t remember _anything_ , Crowley.  People aren’t meant to come back, aren’t meant to remember coming back.”

Crowley did not touch him, knew Bobby would not want that, with them in public and him knotted up with tension as he was.  Crowley had no words either, not about that.  He could have talked about being a demon, of almost forgetting the humanity Bobby talked about as though it was a right, the natural way of things.  But he stayed beside him as they walked, moving from crowded city street to the suburb, three miles out, where the house was.  In this world without magic, where he had no idea of the rules.  Bobby grabbed his hand abruptly, when they were nearly at the house but still, right there in suburbia.  Crowley gripped back, unable to stop a grin spreading over his face.

“There’s another thing I want to try, love,”  he said.  “We should see if we can get in touch with the designer.”

“Of what – hell, you mean Chuck?  We couldn’t get anything out of him with apocalypse blasting off;  why should he answer us here?”

“Curiosity?”  Crowley asked back.  “This is only the second time any of us have crossed worlds – well, three if we count Kyra – don’t you think that might make Him want to take a look?  Especially if he gets a phone call from the one time King of Hell, hmm?”

“You think that’ll do it?”

 “Well, it worked before,”  Crowley said, too casually.

“You talked to Chuck?”  Bobby’s voice was flat, watchful.

“Yes, I did.”

“So when?”

Crowley considered.  “Do you remember when we went to talk to that witch in Stockton, about why all her kindred seemed to be pulling vanishing acts?”

“Sure I do.”   Bobby looked away from him, no doubt remembering, the demon thought, that goodbye spell Lucifer-in-Asha had put on him, which had made for such a delightful encounter later in bed.  Bobby, of course, had been ridden with guilt over his behaviour.

“After that.  I told him he’d better start paying attention to what his Number One Son was doing with his creation.”

“And what did the Almighty have to say to that?”

“That he’s constrained by former agreements.  Has to act through mortal instruments.   In the here and now, you and I are the only possibles, so I think he might tune in.”

Bobby glanced at him curiously.  “Even if that’s so;  you’ve been bitching about not bein’ able to do anything with your powers.  First time you’ve sounded optimistic about the possibility.”

“There’s still heaps of witches and sorcerers and what have you’s floating around,”  Crowley went on, ignoring that.  A couple of people went past them, not showing any interest in them or the conversation, but still, Bobby didn’t immediately drop his hand like a dead fish.  _Progress._   “While I accept there’s no limit to human self-delusion;  it’s perhaps a hint that there’s something around to be accessed.”

“You’re not plannin’ on assassinating a sports stadium of people to light your candle?”  Bobby asked drily.

“Darling, no one lights my candle half so well as you.” 

“ _Crowley!”_

“But no, not yet, though it’s a good suggestion.”  As they got to the house, he amended.  “That might not be enough, anyway.  This dimension is next thing to null, not quite but almost.”

#

They sat on the floor in the living room, which they had laboriously emptied of furniture at Crowley’s direction;  the demon once more complaining that he couldn’t just “whisk them away.”  The floor was wooden boards, which Bobby swept meticulously.  As both hunter and magician, he knew the crucial importance of getting small details correct.  Crowley put a cheap candle on a saucer in the centre of the room.

“What about a circle?”  Bobby asked.  “And wards.”

“Overkill,”  Crowley said dismissively.  He produced a small, sharp knife and looked inquiringly at Bobby.

“Oh hell, why me?”  Bobby was gripping a tiny salt shaker, determined to at least see to the basics, but Crowley appeared to want to go straight to the main act.  Which of course meant blood.  Once upon a long time ago, Bobby remembered drawing his own blood as part of a summons to call the demon to him.

“Going to be both of us, darling.”   As proof, evidently, Crowley made a quick, businesslike cut in his own forearm.  Bobby muttered an oath, took the knife and did the same, mingling their blood at Crowley’s sign, so that it dripped into the candle flame below.  Crowley murmured words in that jaw-breaking Enochian that was no language a human was made to speak.  Bobby thought he caught a few of the Deity’s formal names in the midst, then was sure as Crowley repeated what he had said a second and then a third time.  He would have joined in, to add his own will and intent to the spell, but could not be sure of reproducing the phrases perfectly.  Any mistake would render the spell useless.  He simply closed his eyes for a moment and prayed.

The air in the room seemed colder, though that could be the fact that they were both sitting as still as they could.  “He may hear us,”  Crowley said softly, “but we aren’t able to hear him in return.  No way to tell.”

“I’ve got a few things to hit Him with if’n when,”  Bobby said grimly.  “This weird stuff with time differences….”

“Lucifer could be messing with time or it could be quite usual, considering we’re talking across realities.  Did Sam and or Dean happen to mention anything like that as regards their trip here?”

“Nothin’ about time, no Narnia tricks.”

“No what?”

“Children’s story,”  Bobby said, embarrassed.  “You know, kids find this magical country through a wardrobe, it’s all snowing and full of strange critters and a lion in charge….and they’re there for years ‘n years, but when they accidentally go back through the wardrobe, they’re kids again and it’s been a few minutes.”

The King of Hell’s expression was pure disbelief and Bobby suddenly wanted to laugh.  He supposed Crowley hadn’t spent much time with human fiction;  the reality would’ve kept him busy enough. 

“I read it to Sam when he was little,”   Bobby answered that look.  “I’ll get you a copy when we’re home.”

“Hmm.”   The hunter watched the demon – hard to believe he wasn’t still demonic here - reach for the candle’s wick, then pause, hand outstretched over it.  The tiny flame shivered and went out.  “Like I said, love, not completely null,”  Crowley said softly.  Bobby breathed out in a long sigh, feeling in that small happening the first stirring of hope, maybe.  And another kind of stirring, never mind more serious matters.

He touched Crowley’s shoulder, grasped gently and let go to stand up.  Crowley did, facing him, dark brows raised.  “Message sent, darling,”  he drawled softly.  “Why don’t we get some rest while we have the chance?”

“Rest’s not usually what you got in mind.”

“Well, no, it’s not,”  Crowley agreed, shooting him a wicked grin.  “But we can’t do any more right now and in any case, I rather got the impression you enjoy what I’ve got in mind.”

“You know I do,”  Bobby muttered, feeling his face heat up and cursing that reaction.  They were alone, as they’d been each night since arriving here.  It seemed that half the time before, there’d been people or emergencies or both around and that inhibited the hunter, even if Crowley didn’t care when he was in pursuit of his pleasure.  But here in this place – he still couldn’t get the idea of a different _world_ through his head – at night they couldn’t do much in the way of searching, there was no one around to distract or inhibit and well, he couldn’t really say Crowley had to do much persuading. 

“Come on, lover.”

At the height of things, Bobby heard Crowley reciting something.  Nothing he could understand and his mind was too distracted to ID the language.  He could only keep going until he was done, breathing hard, while Crowley sighed in satisfaction and patted him.

“What were you sayin’  there?”

“Merely responding to the moment, Robert.”

The hunter’s body relaxed completely, his mind struggling to remain clear.  “No,” he murmured, “you said somethin’ - Enochian?  What was that about?”

“We can talk tomorrow, Robert.”   Even Crowley’s voice was a caress.  “When you’re rested.”

“ _Crowley_ , c’mon, what was it?”

“Let’s say the experiment didn’t quite end when we withdrew to the bedroom,”   Crowley said at last.  “I decided to see whether another source of, um, inspiration would enable a link for me to communicate with Chuck.”

It took about five seconds for the penny to drop.  “ _Sex magic_?  You were usin’ me to do sex magic?”  It said a lot that even in the dark, Bobby was certain of just what face Crowley was pulling when Bobby said that.

“I wasn’t the only one doing a bit of using, Robert, but all right, I sense your indignation.  But if I’d told you, you might not have wanted to continue.”

“You got that right.  It’s like – like gettin’ a BJ when you’re on the phone.  And you were talking to God!   Not that I ever…..”

Crowley made a choking noise and buried his face against Bobby’s broad chest.  The hunter sighed, running a hand through Crowley’s hair.

“So – any results?”

“I’m not sure.  There could have been, but I was distracted.”

“Damn well hope so,”   Bobby growled.  He sighed deeply and flopped over on his back, gazing into the dark for a while.  The curtains screened them effectively from the street lights and it felt like all the world was dark and quiet, well, until some damn idiot drove his car loudly past them.  He chuckled suddenly.  “Hey, Crowley?”

“What?”

“This is so damn normal it’s messing with my head.  Don’t it mess with yours?  I mean, you’re used to just flippin’ in and out, between Hell and the world, dealin’ with demons and damned souls and being King, while I told hunter idjits how to hunt monsters and now we’ve just been to the cops to report our kid missing and you’re leaving your smalls laundry in the damn bathroom sink.”

“Doing laundry isn’t something that comes naturally, Robert.  I’m a demonic monarch.”

“Yeah, well, I’m not washing your boxers, princess, so you better take care of it, natural or not.” 

Bobby  slept for some hours after that, waking fairly refreshed to find Crowley still there in bed, apparently snoozing.  No, he was definitely asleep, the hunter thought.  _Was_ he actually human here?  If so, that would mean he’d taken a step back – not in a bad sense – to being a living, pre-judgment human.  This reality had churches and Christianity, together with other battling religions he knew from his own reality.

If Almighty Chuck had written this reality as another draft of his story, one where He was virtually powerless and sequestered away, then how had it come about that he was worshipped at all?  And did this reality have its own Lucifer?  Hell?  How could he go in a moment from considering these weighty things to admiring Crowley as the early morning light revealed him, on his side facing Bobby, everything on display, as it were.  Bobby’s fingers itched to touch.

Crowley yawned himself awake, blinked at Bobby and glanced down at himself.  “Mmm, look at that.  It’s going to be a lovely day, Robert.”

Bobby made a sound that was half groan, half laugh, as he surrendered to the urge to run a finger down Crowley’s brightly tattooed shoulder and see him shiver.  “I guess we’ve got a little while but I wanted to go check with that cop to see when…”

“It won’t happen that fast, Robert,”   Crowley said. 

“It might,”   Bobby said back at him.  “You know that.  Things go slowly and then all of a sudden a mountain of crap falls on you from nowhere.  Or somebody lets the Devil out of his birdcage.”

“Well then, let’s get moving.”

#

They were close enough to the centre of town to walk.  He needed to stay in shape,  Bobby reminded himself.  And Crowley, judging by the complaints, probably needed to _get_ in shape.  Being able to just teleport around didn’t help in the exercise department.  Glancing at him, wondering whether to voice the joke,  he glimpsed the bright flash of a window.  Stained glass, set high in the whitewashed wall of a church.  Beyond it came the sounds of an organ playing.  Early for a service;  perhaps a practice of some kind,  Bobby wondered.   His neck prickled, out of nowhere, as he listened. 

“Hey,”  he said, “I want to take a look in there.  You, uh, can you enter a church?”

Crowley’s look was withering.  “Sam Winchester dragged me into one so he could torture me back to humanity,”  he said.  “You see me before you.  What’s your conclusion?”

“That you’re a sarcastic bastard,”  Bobby told him.  That got a fond smile and Bobby again wondered what the fuck went on in that mind?  “I wasn’t around for that, remember, and sometimes I forget stuff.  Senior moments and all that.  C’mon then and behave yourself.”

There appeared to be no one in the church when they stood in the entrance.  The music had stopped;  perhaps the organist had left through a back way.  Bobby moved carefully, studying the rather bare interior of the building, but more using his other senses to get a feel for the place.  Holy ground?   In his own reality it would be, and secure enough to prevent quite a few monsters from intruding upon it.  Demons, though, were Chuck’s creations too, albeit secondhand courtesy of Lucifer.  Who, as an archangel, could also stand on holy ground.

 _Don’t know what good it does, if it don’t bar him_ ,  Bobby thought.  He hadn’t even checked what variety of Christianity this church served, but it didn’t matter, though probably its followers and its pastor or priest would not agree.  The bare furnishings suggested some form of Presbyterianism, maybe even of the fundamental variety.  Hellfire-and-brimstone certainly existed here;  he’d checked those out on television.  There were pews, of course, and a lectern up on a podium but he couldn’t see an actual altar beyond that.

Crowley went up the steps to the podium and smirked at him over the lectern.  “What a pity there’s not an altar with candles and incense,”   he murmured.  “You could take me right here on top of it;  that would spark some power, if anything in this world would.”

“Shut up!”   Bobby growled, horrified to find himself responding in a way which would delight Crowley if he saw.  Crowley only grinned.  The damndest thing was that the demon was probably correct, _if_ performance anxiety didn’t scotch any chance on Bobby’s part.  Reluctantly he asked, “Do you sense anything?”   Gesturing in a circle with one hand.

“Very little,”   the demon said.

“Hello, hello!”  a voice called from beyond the dais.  A door, Bobby now saw, probably leading to an office of some kind.  The man emerging wore no priest collar, but the sober dark suit, sans tie, certainly indicated clergy of some kind.  Salt and pepper hair, probably close to Bobby’s own age.  “I’m sorry, I was talking to Sally about the recital and then seeing her off. Have you been waiting long?”

“Uh, no,”   Bobby said.  “We heard the music from outside.”

“Isn’t she wonderful?  We’re so lucky to have a pianist of her ability.  I’m Pastor Michaels, by the way and you are?”

Seeing no reason not to, Bobby gave their actual names.  He was a bit embarrassed by the man’s enthusiasm;  it made it harder to lie to him.  Still possible, of course,   Crowley was studying him as though he was some rare insect, possibly venomous.  Michaels shook Bobby’s hand heartily, not seeming to notice how Crowley stayed out of arm’s reach.  Perhaps, the hunter thought, he was more aware of nuances than he seemed and wouldn’t push a handshake on someone unwilling.  Surely that should go with the job, even if he hadn’t clicked that a genuine servant of the Evil One (okay, _estranged_ servant) was within three feet of him.

Michaels said something encouraging about Sunday services,  “Everyone loves to meet new people and of course…..ah… ack….”   Bobby, who had been glancing around while trying to think of a diplomatic way out, looked quickly back at the pastor, who sounded as though he was about to choke.   His eyes were rolling back and the hunter awkwardly moved closer to support the guy.  _Wouldn’t look good if we got found over the body of a local pastor._

“Don’t worry, Bobby, I’m all right.”

Bobby, who had introduced himself as Robert Singer, began a startled look, then…. “Oh.”

“About time,”   Crowley said. “Bobby Singer, meet Chuck, otherwise known as your belated God.”

“It’s not exactly easy to manifest in this dimension,”   Chuck argued.  It was definitely Him,  the demon saw;    the pastor now demonstrated the expressions and body language familiar from meeting Chuck’s avatar in the bunker.

“Thought you had to have permission,”  Bobby growled.  He had heard the Chuck saga from Sam and Dean, but admitted silently he’d wondered about a lot of it.

“I’m a deity, I don’t _have_ to have anything, but it’s true I set things up that way.  But Johnny Michaels here is a true believer – I have permanent permission.   As for about time, it took you a precious long chunk of it to come on to holy ground and find someone I could speak through, you know.”

“We were kinda busy looking for our kid,”  Bobby retorted.  “Also, I’m hanging out with a demon here – a church wasn’t exactly my first port of call.”

“Hanging out?   Is that what it’s called these days?”

“Shut up, Crowley!   Can you find her?”  Bobby continued quickly. 

“I know where she is, yes, and she’s fine.  She’s on her way to you, don’t worry.  But I don’t have very long.  I can’t stay in Johnny much longer or I’ll damage him.  Listen, once she’s with you, you and Kyra need to get back to work.  I’ll set you in position;  you and the boys need to take care of the rest.  Castiel’s with Sam and Dean, by the way.  Gemma’s bringing the Sons, but Rowena changes her plans so often I can’t keep track.  I’m sure she’ll, ah, do the right thing eventually…..”

“Where’s Lucifer?   Is he back home, ah, our home?   Or carrying out some plan of conquest here?”

Michaels’  mouth opened, his eyes rolled white for a moment and then he began talking again….. “….and I’m sure you’ll feel right at home.  The service begins at ten am but people often congregate from about nine thirty.  I do hope you’ll decide to come along?”

Still dazed, Bobby managed to extricate them without actually promising to attend.  Crowley moved close to him as though afraid Bobby was about to keel over, but the hunter muttered that he was all right.  “Let’s get back – I gotta sit down.”

Once inside the apartment,  Bobby suited action to word, sitting down heavily on the couch and leaning his head against his hand.  “That was so not fucking helpful!”

“He did tell us Kyra would find us.”

“Yeah, but how?   She doesn’t know where the heck we are.”

“Let’s hope Chuck was able to provide her with sufficient heavenly inspiration,”  Crowley said.   His confidence made Bobby give him a distrustful look.  The demon king smirked at him and rested a hand on the hunter’s jeans clad knee, smoothly inching it upwards.  “Speaking of heavenly inspiration…”

“Geez, Crowley, it’s only been a few hours….”   Bobby looked at him, reluctantly returning the grin and then wrapped his arms firmly around the surprised demon’s body, hugging him hard.  He was a bit surprised himself by the sudden swelling of affection he felt.  Hope, too, that they would make it home, despite a certain deity being somewhat vague about the details.

“Bobby?”  Crowley’s voice sounded a little muffled against Bobby’s chest, but not at all distressed.

“Mmm?”

“Can I have my hand back?”

“Oh, sorry.”  Bobby loosened his hug enough for Crowley to free his arm.  “If it hadn’t been goin’ where it was, it wouldn’t have been in trouble.”

“Story of my unlife, darling.”

“Chuck dodged tellin’ us anything about Lucifer, didn’t He?”

“He may not be aware.”   The demon sighed, then decided literally;  what the hell, no one was watching, and laid his head against Bobby’s chest, soothed by the comforting sound of Bobby’s living heartbeat as the hunter settled his muscular arms around Crowley again.  “You know he and Amara took off for dimensions unknown, perhaps to work on some more “drafts” of reality.”

“I know because Sam and Dean told me, but I can’t get my head around it.”  Bobby stroked Crowley’s hair, enjoying the warmth of the demon’s body against him, the pure oddness of their situation.   They were still waiting, he realised, but waiting with a new calm, an assurance that the person they sought would find them.  _Literal message from God_ , the hunter thought, _and it took a demon to get His attention._


	7. Journey of the Little Fox

“So how come you’re here?”

It had taken some time for Kyra to get around to asking somebody that apparently simple question.

It wasn’t the thing, she knew from her own experience, to ask why somebody was in foster care.  Most of the time.   Very occasionally, though, you had to ask it.

Khadija had started to seek her out, after that episode with the boys and the computer.  She never actually referred to any of it;  just started showing up nearby, giving her a quick smile now and then, or helped her with homework.  The two of them were on kitchen duty one night, which meant loading dishes and cutlery into the washer and tidying everything up, which wasn’t so bad.   It beat the kitchen in the bunker, which was stuck in the 1950s, and the house in Charming hadn’t had a dishwasher either.  She’d trade, Kyra thought fiercely, she’d happily be stuck for an entire _night_ washing dishes by hand, if it got her Bobby and Crowley again.

Kyra made the first cautious overture to friendship by mentioning out loud that she’d been found in the middle of a busy crossroads, not remembering how she’d got there.  “I know I had foster parents before, but nobody could find them,”   she said, passing another plate after scraping it.

“Maybe they were your real parents?”  Khadija suggested.

“No.  I’d know.”

“But if you can’t remember….”

“So how come you’re here?”   The older girl was quiet at that and Kyra quickly moved off to wipe down the counter.  You could ask somebody you thought might be becoming an actual friend, but if they froze up, you had to just act like you hadn’t said anything.

“Usually, if something happens to your parents, somebody in the community would take care of you, if you didn’t have any other family,”  Khadija said, in a tone which suggested that was only logical.  Kyra didn’t say anything about her starting in the middle.  She made an agreeing sort of noise and looked for somewhere to hang the cloth she was using.

“On the hook to your right,”  Khadija said, and then, in a sort of rush.  “In the Muslim community, I mean.  But it was so bad – what he did was so bad.   They moved me from that city to here, they had to.  That was four years ago.”

“You should’ve got fostered out to a family!  I mean, you’re nice!”

Khadija actually laughed at that, just a little.

“You don’t beat boys up or use bad language or – or anything!”

“I don’t have an imam I can talk to or older Muslims so I just try to remember the things my mother told me and follow that.  She said that all I needed to do to be a proper Muslim was to be kind to others, to wear the hijab and remember the _shahada.”_

“What’s that?”

“The declaration of faith.”   Khadija looked around as though scared of being overheard, then recited softly but clearly “There is no god but God.  Muhammad is the messenger of God.”

Then she spoke in a language Kyra guessed must be Arabic. “That’s how I should say it.”

“But there are Muslim people living around here.  I’ve seen them.”

“I don’t want to bother them.  They might have heard about my father.”

“But you’re not responsible for what he did, whatever it was.  I’m not asking you,”  Kyra added in a rush.  She knew it was useless to try to change somebody’s mind when they were really fixed on something and she could see that Khadija was.

Margaret looked in, noting the intensity of the exchange.  “You girls finished up?”  she asked.  “It’s nearly time you went to bed.”

She hadn’t appeared to notice anything, but a few days later, Kyra’s two room-mates, who were noisy and asked rude questions when they noticed her at all, were moved to another room and Khadija was told to move in with Kyra.    On the first evening, Khadija seemed nervous and jumpy and finally asked if Kyra minded if she prayed there.

“You need me to go away?”  Kyra asked, trying to work out what her friend was getting at.

“No, just that you don’t mind?”

“Why would I mind?”  Kyra was baffled.  She lay on her bed watching Khadija get out a small rug and lay it out.  She had her dark hair loose, but now carefully confined it within the hijab so that none of it showed.  Then she stood, arms outstretched, and began to speak softly in Arabic.  Kyra, who had been expecting something along the “Now I lay me down to sleep” line, watched in silent fascination as the detailed prayers continued and as her friend moved from standing to kneeling and finally prostrating herself on the rug, while keeping a wary eye on the door in case Margaret or Jeff came to tell them to shut up and turn the light out.

Finding herself sleepy, Kyra decided to just go to bed and trust that her moving around wasn’t going to distract Khadija.   She was opening the chest of drawers to find her PJs when Khadija spoke from behind her.  It was definitely her voice but sounded strange.  “Kyra Singer?”   And that was way out strange.  She spun around, finding the other girl just standing there, staring at her.

“Hello, Kyra.  We haven’t met, but Bobby and Crowley know me as Chuck.”

“You’ve _possessed_ her?  While she’s praying!”

“I’m God.  I’m allowed to borrow one of the faithful, in a time of need and there’s a great need, so please listen.  I don’t have long.  Remember this address.  It’s in this city.”   Her friend’s voice recited an unknown address, but then anywhere beyond the immediate streets were strange to Kyra.  “That’s not close but you need to get there as soon as you can.  That’s where Bobby and Crowley are and they….”

“Wait!”  Kyra interrupted, earning a look of extreme indignation that made Khadija look totally alien.  “You have to help her – Khadija, who you’re, um, in.   She needs to meet an imam and find friends.  She thinks they won’t like her because of her father.”

“Khadija’s father killed her mother,”   Chuck said quietly.  “He’s in prison serving a life sentence.  The authorities removed the child to another city and state before the mother’s family could claim her, which they would have.  I’ll set things in motion for them to find her, starting with that imam.”

“Why didn’t you do it before?  She’s been here for four years and praying to you!”

“I was a bit distracted,”   the Deity complained.  “You try running multiple reality scenarios and see how well you do.”  More gently he added.  “I’ll sort it out now.  I promise.”

“What about, ah, Lucifer?  Is he here?”

“Lucifer’s busy back in your dimension.  I haven’t been tracking that one for awhile…”

“Because you’re distracted!”

“Just so.  He’s trying to break down the doors of Heaven, which is something that’s going to need the concerted efforts of all of you to halt…”

“…..and I really should pray five times a day but I almost never get the chance.  I probably said the prayers all wrong.”

Kyra knew her expression was probably all wrong too, by the worried way Khadija – and it was really her again – was looking at her, but she forced a grin. “Well, I don’t speak Arabic so I don’t know, and God probably knows what you really meant.”

By the time she’d reassured Khadija, they’d raised their voices for a while, so it was no surprise when Margaret did stick her head in and order them to bed.

#

They were _here_.  In the same city, even though there were something like 300,000 people in the city for them to get lost among.  Rowena really had tried to send Kyra close to Crowley, considering there was a whole planet for her to be dumped in.  She wanted to get up now, in the middle of the night, and just run until she got there.

If she’d been only a little bit younger, she might have done it.

Fleetingly, Kyra considered confiding in Margaret;  maybe trying to talk her into giving her a ride.  But Margaret would probably just tell the police and she didn’t think Bobby _or_ Crowley would be happy to see her if she was riding in a police car. 

She tried to find a street directory but had no luck.  When she said that to Khadija when they were walking to school;  said school being about five minutes walk from the group home, her friend shrugged and said that stuff was probably online.  “Do you know this city?”   Kyra asked. “Like where this is?”

Khadija looked at the address.  “Sorry.  I really only know the area around here.”

“Me too.”

“Why do you want to go here?”

_You told me this address when God was possessing you, only you don’t seem to know about it._

“I, uh, remembered it.  But not why it’s important so I want to go look.”

“You could ask Margaret.  Or somebody in the school library.”

And back around to that again.  She might be able to find a directory in the library, Kyra supposed.  But she got no chance all day, not even in the lunch break, because some of the other girls chose then to give her and Khadija a hard time.  Kyra tried to keep her cool, she so did, but at some point something just snapped.

The problem was;  Bobby had taught her how to really hit.

So she spent the lunch break in the principal’s office to start with, and then at a desk in homeroom under the annoyed eye of one of the teachers, who was no happier to be there than she was, because neither Jeff nor Margaret could be contacted.  Some other acting out kid had their attention right then.

So she had that to look forward to when she got back.  She stomped out of the school beside Khadija.   “It doesn’t matter what they say,”   her friend began.

“So it’s okay if they call you a stinking raghead, is it?”

“Of course it’s not okay but when you hit them, you make them the victim and that’s a real pain.”

“Yeah.  I can see that.”

Kyra stopped on the pavement, nearly making Khadija walk into her. “I’m going over there,”   she announced.  “Right now.  You can tell them I ran off because it’ll be true.”

Khadija grabbed her sleeve. “I’m coming with you.”

“You’ll get in trouble.  You don’t _get_ in trouble.”

“So they’ll know it’s important, right?”

Kyra wasn’t so sure, but she marched into the nearest shop, a small milk bar, and pushed her piece of paper with the scrawled address on it under the nose of the elderly Chinese proprietor.  “Can you tell me where to find this place, please?”

He blinked curiously at the girls and read the paper.  “This is not near here.  You are lost?”

“No, we’re not lost, we live nearby, but I need to get to here.  Can you please tell me how to get there?  Do you have a street directory?”

Wonder of wonders, he did;  a book so old it was almost in pieces as he laid it out and ponderously searched through it until Kyra wanted to scream.  So close, so freaking far away.  Why hadn’t Chuck just given her a phone number so she could call Bobby and ask him to come find _her_?   Because she never got a freaking break, that was why.

“Here,”  said the old man at last, tracing a thumbnail along a road.  “We are here.   Here is the nearest main road – northwards along this road.  Here is my shop.  This is your path.”   Kyra listened so hard she could feel a headache start and a growing desperation that she was never going to remember all that.  The old man looked at her and she felt that he saw right through to all that anxious impatience.  “Your journey is very important,”   he said after a long pause.  Kyra tried to work out whether he meant that as a question, then gave up.

“Yes.”   _So why am I still standing here?_

“I will throw the coins for you.”

He got up and reached under the counter.  Kyra gave Khadija a confused look as he produced a small cup and shook three coins of no currency she recognised on to the counter.  “I Ching,”   her friend murmured, making Kyra none the wiser.  But this was weird enough to get her attention and she watched as he studied the coins – one with a blank face and the other two with ornate designs facing upwards.  He scooped them up again, threw and studied, repeating the process four more times before he dropped the coins back into the cup and returned it to its place.

Rowena had said there was no magic here, but this looked like a kind of prophecy.   The old man smiled slightly at her.  “This is Wei Chi,”  he said.  “It is the final hexagram and it indicates hope for the future, if you are strong.  The little fox must not get its tail wet.  But it will be a terrible battle that you join and you must silence your inner doubt to succeed.”

“How do you know?”  Kyra spluttered.

He shrugged a little.  “I don’t know anything.  The coins tell me – just as they told me that a maiden would come here today with questions.”   He bowed slightly and Kyra found herself returning it, rather awkwardly, but it felt like the right thing to do.

“Thank you,”   she said.

“Kyra, come on,”  Khadija urged.  “We have to go.”   She made a nervous farewell gesture towards the shop’s proprietor;  he bowed slightly again as they hurried out.   Khadija’s edginess was increasing and she jumped when Kyra touched her arm and turned to face her friend.

“You can’t come with me.  I need you to put Margaret and Jeff off the trail.”

“What trail?  They won’t know where we are.  If I’m there, they’re going to make me tell.”

“You don’t _have_ to tell.  Or lie, if that bothers you, just don’t answer.  Cry and freak out, that works on adults.  Uh – do you have any money for a bus fare?”

Sighing, Khadija fished in her jeans and brought out a banknote.  “That should be enough.  Call me when you – oh, you wouldn’t get past Jeff or Margaret and they won’t pass it on.”

“I’ll email if I can.”

They stared at each other, quite aware that this could be it, that Kyra was setting off a train of events that might separate them forever.  “Where are you really from?”  Khadija asked.

“Another Earth.”

“Kyra….”

“If I can, I’ll contact you, but I don’t know what’ll happen.”

“Are your parents really at this address?  Which you won’t explain how you know.”

“If I said God told me, would you believe me?”   She paused, noted the other girl’s confusion and had mercy on it.  “It’s okay.  He also said he’d organise somebody to help you – find family for you – so when that happens, remember I told you.  All right?”   They hugged, quick and awkward, the behaviour of people who might have been friends had there been more time.  Then Kyra pulled away and with a nervous wave, jogged off down the road.  Northwards.

On her own again.

There was a bus, then a long wait at a bus station for another bus, and a final disembarkation at a darkening roadside with not enough street lights around.  She jogged along a road without even being sure it was the correct one, from the bus driver’s vague indication and, “You sure you want to get off here, kid?”   House after house, some with lit windows, some dark, and people passing her on the street, talking and laughing too loudly.  Stupid to be scared, here in summer with no apocalypse and no monsters, but she didn’t know where else she could run to from here.

She tried to read numbers on mailboxes but some were too dark, so she wasn’t at all sure where she was.  The wind was picking up and the night becoming cool.  She didn’t have a warm jacket, only a stupid flimsy cardigan they’d given her at the group home and was starving hungry besides, not even sure how many hours since she’d eaten lunch.  She made herself slow down, tried to breathe slowly.  If she freaked out on the street, somebody would call the police about the lost child and then she’d be back in the system. 

_Walk along like you belong where you are and nobody’s gonna notice you._

Bobby’s voice, gruff and reassuring, echoed in her mind.  Kyra followed his advice.  She saw someone walking a small white dog, turn down a driveway and called out to him, keeping her voice relaxed.  “Excuse me, mister?  I’m looking for number 16, am I close?”

“Pretty well,”  the man said, pulling back the excited terrier.  “This is 21, so a couple more on the other side that way.”

“Thank you.”   She walked on.  _Don’t look back.  He’s not watching you._   Still, she felt as though eyes were burning into her back as she crossed the road, found 16, which was a building divided into four apartments, only then realising that if Chuck had specified which one it was, her memory hadn’t retained that small detail.  Three of the four had their lights switched on while one, on the ground floor, was dark.  No sounds, but then she wouldn’t hear anything here at the edge of the property. 

As she crossed the boundary line, Kyra felt a cold tingling strike her feet and move through her body, like a very low key electric shock, as though she’d brushed very slightly against a powered fence.  She looked down at the dark ground but of course saw nothing.  _Wards?_ She crouched down next to a bush growing close to the road and waited.  No response from anyone inside any of the apartments.

 _Nothing for it._   She got to her feet and headed for the foyer, hoping that the outer door wouldn’t be locked.  It was.

Well, she’d had practice waiting.  Sooner or later some resident was going to come in or out and she could maybe talk them into letting her in.  She turned away from the door…and almost screamed.  He was right _there_ ….Black suit, black shirt, silver tie and trademark smirk, which faded almost as soon as she saw his face. “Strangers,”  Crowley murmured, then nodded to her and moved ahead to the door.  “Did you forget your key card, young lady?”  he asked, loudly enough for anyone around to have heard him.

“Yes, I’m sorry.”

“It’s no problem.”   He held the door for her and Kyra walked through, heading straight to the lifts without looking at him, as though he was indeed a stranger.  Neither she nor Crowley spoke as they waited.  He pressed the 3 button and they rode up, still silent.  Kyra followed him to one of the doors and inside.  “Clear,”   Crowley said.

“Crowley.  What’s happening?”  Kyra asked edgily.

“Kyra?”   Bobby’s voice and then the hunter himself, rising from an armchair and hastening over to seize her in a crushing hug, pulling Crowley close too with one arm.  For a long while Kyra just stood there in the embrace until she began to feel the need for air.

“Bobby, I can’t breathe!”

“Sorry, sweetheart.”   He released her, still staring at her face.  “You’re taller, how the heck did that happen?  All Crowley said was that somebody tripped the wards alarm.  I didn’t think he could _do_ any magic here!”

“Easier since our visitation,”   Crowley drawled.  “I told you it’s not a complete null here.  Most people couldn’t manage it but I’m not most people.  The wards were set to respond if anyone from our dimension crossed the property line.  I was thinking of things a bit larger and with more teeth than Kyra, but whatever works.”

He sounded as indifferent as ever, but his hazel gaze remained on her as though he didn’t want to look away, and he had an arm casually around her as well as the one around Bobby’s waist.

“Have you got anything to eat here?”  Kyra asked.  “I haven’t had anything to eat for hours.  Then I’ll tell you what’s happened.”

“Things have happened to us too,”   Bobby assured her.  “Yeah, we’ve got some pizza.  Sit down, I’ll get you a plate.”

In the apartment’s rather bland, one-décor-fits-all living room, Kyra ate pizza and drank juice, with both of them watching her.  It should have been unsettling, but instead she felt safe for the first time since she’d stumbled through the portal.  Once the food was in, she started to tell her story in awkward fits and starts, sometimes pausing to let Bobby or Crowley tell their side of what had been happening at that particular time.

Eventually they reached the subject of Chuck and just what Crowley had meant by “visitation.”

“He possessed my friend Khadija,”   Kyra said with some indignation.  “While she was praying.  I thought that was kind of rude but he said since she was a believer…”

“….he was allowed.  Yeah, we got the same line,”   Bobby agreed.  “I guess his followers don’t bother to read the small print before they sign.”

“But why were you so weird outside?”  Kyra asked Crowley, making Bobby choke up coughing for several moments. “Pretending you didn’t know me.  Nobody else knows you here, so why?”

“No one except Chuck,”   the demon said, suddenly grim.  “If he could find us the way he did, other beings might also.”

“Somebody said I would succeed if I was strong but it would be a terrible battle,”   Kyra remembered, shivering slightly.

“What’s that?”  Bobby asked, losing any sign of being amused.

“This old man….”   She explained as best she could, still confused by the whole episode.  “He wanted to throw the coins for us, I guess it’s like Tarot cards.  Khadija said it was I Ching.  And I got the answer that said hope for the future but there’d be this battle and something about not getting wet….”

“Do you remember what hexagram it was?”  Crowley asked.  “What number?”

“The final one, he said.”

“Ah.”   Crowley smiled.

“That’s good?”   Bobby asked.  “I’ve read about I Ching but never had any call to use it.”

“No, love, it’s very philosophical and generally counsels patience and strength of character rather than shooting things with salt buckshot and the other activities hunters are so fond of.”

“C’mon, it’s been ages since I threatened you with that.  So what does it actually mean?”

“Time of struggle,”  Crowley mused, visibly pulling the answer out of the vast archives of his memory.  Bobby watched him, wondering what it was like to be able to remember over four centuries.  “All misgivings that might arise in such grave times of struggle must be silenced….a fierce battle to break the power of the Devil….”

“So what’s the bit about not getting wet?”  Kyra asked.

“The young fox breaks through the river ice and falls into the water, if he isn’t careful.  That’s you, I would imagine.  Means you’re important to the endeavour…if you don’t screw up.”

“So no pressure?”

“No more than there ever was,”  said the King of Hell.

Bobby started to say something encouraging to her, to remind her that he and Crowley would look out for her, that no kid was expected to carry the whole weight of anything, but then saw the way she and Crowley were looking at one another.  Not challenging, but there for each other, was the best way he could put it;  the centuries-old demon and a human barely into double digits.

“Well, let’s hope we find our way back home then,”  he said at last.

“Do you know how to get us home?”   Kyra asked, looking from one to the other.  “Because Rowena put me here, but she didn’t say anything about getting me back.”

“Yeah, and that’s only one of the things on my what-the-hell list,”  Bobby muttered. 

“She doesn’t do anything to be nice,”  Crowley cautioned.  “No matter what she said;  she didn’t help you get away from Lucifer because it was the right thing to do.  For Rowena, the right thing is helping Rowena.”

“I couldn’t not go,”  Kyra said. 

“Of course not.  Just don’t be mistaken as to her motives.”

“Chuck said somethin’  about putting us in place.  Maybe he’s gonna arrange something,”  Bobby muttered.  “Look, whatever, we can’t do anything right now.  We’re in here now and all’s calm out there?”  Crowley nodded.  “So Kyra needs to get some sleep and then in the morning we’ll make some plans.”


	8. Mortal Instruments

Even being on the other side of a door from Bobby and Crowley was enough to heighten Kyra’s anxiety, but she was _not_ going to insist on being in the same room, even though she knew both of them would have been okay with it.  Bobby made up a bed for her on the couch, promising that the next day they’d get some clothes and things for her but right now, she’d have to manage with one of his T-shirts as a sleep shirt.  It was long enough on her to be a dress.

“You hear anythin’ you don’t like or you get worried, just knock on the door and I’ll be right out,”   the hunter assured her.

Kyra nodded.  She was so tired and so relieved, she didn’t think there’d be a problem.  She hugged him, then lunged for Crowley and embraced the demon too, closing her eyes against his black coat lapel as he gave her a somewhat awkward embrace in return.

“I’ll try not to knock for awhile,”  she promised.

“For at least fifteen minutes, pet,”   he murmured back and she laughed.  It felt so good.

#

Crowley stretched out in bed, surprised at the relief he felt at Kyra’s return.  He was more surprised when Bobby stripped off to his boxers and joined him, putting an arm around his shoulders and giving him a brief kiss.

“I thought this might be a night off, love, given our company.”

The hunter laughed;  that deep, warm sound which reached right into Crowley’s being.  “Wasn’t planning on jumping you right away.  I’m still kinda on alert, true, but hopefully things stay quiet for a bit.  I figure I’ll give her enough time to get to sleep before I stick my head out there to check.”

“Well, I’m not going to fight you off if you change your mind, darling.”

“Ha.”  

Then Bobby hesitated and Crowley smirked, then rolled to the side and got to his feet, reaching for his lurid robe. [“If I have to be dressed by Goodwill, then I’m going _pink_.”]

“It’s all right, love.  I’ll check.”

Kyra was in bed but definitely still awake;  his senses told him that, even without the low lighting provided by a lamp in the corner.  She had rather shamefacedly asked for a light to stay on.  She shifted under the covers and looked quietly at Crowley.  “I was wondering if you’d still be there, if I opened the door.”

“Same,”  he said.

“That’s a really horrible robe.”

“All the fashionable ladies were wearing these about thirty years ago, darling.”   He sat down on the nearest armchair.

“Do you think Lucifer told your – Rowena to let me go?  And maybe put a tracer on me?”

“A magical trace wouldn’t work,”  Crowley said, so definitely that Kyra relaxed.  “But Lucifer now knows that Rowena can create a successful portal, so you might have been a guinea pig for that.”

“But he wanted me as bait for you and Bobby.  He said so.”

“Prince of Lies, remember.”

“I know, but…”   Kyra sat up, earnestly leaning forward.  “He kept me a prisoner for ages.  Why wait so long to test it out?”

“Might have taken Rowena a while to work it out or she might have been playing Lucifer.”

This idea, Kyra had to admit, had merit.  She sighed, beginning to feel sleepy again as her nerves settled, though any sound still made her jump, expecting the police to bang on the door any moment.  She hadn’t left Khadija in a good spot, she knew, though at least that meant Margaret (she didn’t care that much about Jeff!) was aware that Kyra was all right, though the group house parent would be worried that she was chasing a false lead and was out in the night on her own.  Enough kids had done that kind of thing.

Crowley noted her edginess.  “None of them are going to find you,”  he said.  “Not Lucifer’s mob or Child Services, no one.”

Kyra wondered how a tone that ominous could sound so reassuring, but it did.  A lot of people said things like they’d kill to protect somebody or to have something, but Crowley really meant it and saw no problem with it.  Bobby had told her that once, as a kind of warning that Crowley didn’t figure the odds like a normal person.  But right now, hearing this from Crowley sounded pretty good.

“Thank you.”

“You’re welcome, darling.”

He rose and silently headed back to the bedroom, letting the offensive garment drape over the chair where Bobby had put his clothes.

“Everything okay?”  Bobby asked from the bed.

“She’s worried about Lucifer, like any sensible person, which makes three of us,”  Crowley sighed.  The hunter held out an arm and Crowley went to him, settling close in his burly embrace.  “I’m also worried about God, aka Chuck.  What was that again?  _Listen, once she’s with you, you and Kyra need to get back to work.  I’ll set you in position_.”  Just what position are we expected to assume?  Are we agents or chess pieces?”

“God’s never been great at explaining.”

“How true.  Well, darling, I think you get a night off anyway.  I can see your heart’s not in it and I think I need to listen out, tonight.”

“Lemme mark it in my diary.”

“ _Sarcasm,_ Robert, I’m deeply wounded.”

He got a whiskery kiss for that, and slid down to lean his cheek against Bobby’s chest, the hunter’s arms around him.  Bobby was soon asleep, the warmth of his broad, muscular body and the steady rhythm of his heartbeat soothing the demon lying beside him.  Crowley could sleep, if he wished, but did not require it, and so he did no more than drift.  He became sleepily aware of a voice speaking to him, inside his mind, and that it had been doing so for some time, gradually making itself known.

“ _Choose, Crowley.  I told you that you would have the choice of what your nature will be, to remain demon or return to human.  I will unmake what demonkind did to make you one of them, if you wish it.”_

“Will I age and die and go through the damn mill again then?”  He formed the words only in his mind, fearing to disturb Bobby.   Even as relaxed as he’d been, he felt angry at the thought of being thrown back to the beginning of all that he had built.  “You could cheat me and return me to Hell again, a powerless thing, unable to help Robert.”

 _“Love won’t send him to Hell,”_ Chuck – he knew it was Chuck – said gently. _“Or you.  You could be human alongside him, part of his family.”_

“I’m part of his family anyway,”  Crowley snarled.  There was no answer and he waited with impatience – how were you supposed to know when the Almighty was walking out on you if He was just a voice in your head? – and then said quietly, “Well?”  Still nothing and the question was still open, wasn’t it?  Wouldn’t he know if he wasn’t demon?  Given all his years, he’d been human for such a brief time that he could barely remember now, what it had been like.  Not good, he knew that for certain.  He sighed in the dark, listening to Bobby’s breathing, part of him attuned to Kyra in the other room, alert for any disturbance.  There was none.  There was no warning at all.

Very abruptly, there was no bed beneath him.  He thumped down several feet to a hard, smooth surface.  Darkness flashed to bright, clear light.  In a reversal of their arrival in Charming, Bobby was sprawled in ungainly fashion on top of him, huffing and swearing in shock.  Crowley had to push him so that he could stand, holding back from using his powers for no reason he could immediately find, but paranoia was often useful and he trusted his instincts.  Bobby muttered in shock and managed to shift enough to let Crowley get to his feet and then haul the hunter up after him.  Kyra was beside them, a blanket clutched a round her, all wide-eyed panic.

They were in a wide corridor, white marble stretching each way.  White walls, with a series of doors set in them, again white.  A chill, tense atmosphere around them.  Crowley made a “wait” gesture to the others and stepped close enough to read one of the signs on doors, then the next, frowning to himself.

“Crowley….”   Bobby, confused with sleep, rubbed his temples as though he had a headache and looked around him with growing unease.  “Kyra, stay with me.”   He touched her blanket-wrapped shoulder, urging her over to where Crowley stood.  “This looks like…but it can’t be…”

“If you know where we are, enlighten us,”  Crowley requested.

“Heaven,”  Bobby said simply.  “I’m rememberin ’-  all of it.  This here is what I found when I broke out of my Heaven the first time.  Didn’t get much further on, just opened the door on a whole host of the other Bobbys to provide a distraction to help the boys.  When the angels found out, they booted me…you know about that.”

“This does not look like anyone’s Heaven,”  Crowley commented.  “Not that I would know.”

“It’s not.  It’s the…uh…the administration zone.  Through the doors, you get your own heaven, your ideal, whatever that might be.”   He studied the names.  “We’re nowhere near mine.”   Somewhat grumpily, he looked down at himself, wearing only his boxers.  So, of course, was Crowley, but since he considered his meatsuit itself as clothing, the demon only glanced down for a moment and then shrugged it off.

“Can you, uh, get clothes for us?”  Bobby asked hopefully.

“I don’t have my powers back,”  Crowley said sharply, looking slowly around him as though expecting someone to materialise and explain.  “It’s not even like it was in that null-dimension, where I was limited, but I still knew magic.  I don’t know what the situation is here, but I feel….nothing.”

“Like there’s a circuit breaker,”  Bobby suggested, rubbing his forehead as though in pain.

Crowley made an impatient, nervous gesture at him, still turning around to watch his surroundings.  “Someone put us here, so they expect something to happen.  What was that you said about Lucifer, when you were telling us what Chuck said to you?”

“That he was busy,” Kyra said.  “Breaking down the door to Heaven.”

The silence around them was heavy and endless.   Crowley reflected on what Bobby had said;  that Heaven made it difficult to think certain thoughts.  It was part of how they kept the resident souls content and calm.  _I don’t see how that’s better than Hell.  Okay, so we put souls through fearful physical and mental torments, but we don’t tell them what to_ think, _though not too many are much good at it._   This silence was making it difficult to even think of violence against Heaven, whether there were angels actually at the barricades somewhere or not.

“You know where this door is, don’t you?” he asked Bobby.

“I don’t have a freaking clue,”  growled the hunter, gesturing around them in a wild circle.  “I saw this area for the first time when I broke out – you gotta understand, before then I didn’t know you _could_ break out till the boys contacted me….I was home.  I had my place and everything was good.  I could visit friends, hell, I spent time in the Roadhouse – Ash’s heaven;  hunters used to gather there before it got burned down.  But they were watchin’ me, listenin’ to my thoughts, after the break out….that damn Metatron guy…and while I was out of my heaven, I guess my mind started to wake up properly.  I started dreamin’ about you.” His glare dared Crowley to smirk, but the demon only looked at him, seeming stunned.  “You couldn’t be in Heaven,”  Bobby said, very quietly. 

“And so your discontent built and the angels became aware of it,”  Crowley said, so quietly that Bobby nodded.  “So then, they know we’re here.”

“They have to,”  Bobby said, returning to himself abruptly.  “So they’re busy and we need to find ‘em.”

“Not exactly.”

And there was the voice they had been listening for.  As it spoke the drawling words, their surroundings blinked out and now they stood in the middle of a nursery, but a vast, elaborate setup that could have served the needs of a hundred children, instead of the single one who sat on a central rug of garish colors, playing with a scattering of Lego blocks, totally absorbed and ignoring them and also the being who sat nearby, sprawled on a huge cushion.  Lucifer wore faded jeans and a black T-shirt with a beer logo.  His blond hair was ruffled and the smirk he gave them was supremely triumphant.

“All that trouble I go to and you just drop in,”  Lucifer drawled amiably, looking from one to another.  “A mite underdressed to call on royalty, aren’t you, but I just bet there’s a fun story there.  Interrupt something hot and heavy between you and the ex-King of Hell, did I, Mister Singer?”

“There’s a kid present, you bastard,”  Bobby growled, anger giving him his voice and some of his confidence back. 

“Oh, I don’t think so,”  Lucifer said, his stare dwelling on Kyra.  “I think that’s my second-best suit, that got lost somewhere along the way, when I was keeping it so carefully to haul you in, you and Crowley.”  His stare switched to the demon and something hot and sick roiled in those eyes, something unbelievably ancient.  “So now you’re gonna watch, and when I’m through with her, you’ll be next and you get to watch all of it, Crowley, while I get to watch _you_.  Never thought it’d come to a time where I could get hold of _two_ mortals whose suffering would hurt you, King of the Demons.”  He made his tone light, like a children’s game.  _Never a real King, were you?_

Crowley saw the fear grow in Bobby, the thought that it might be Lucifer responsible for bringing them here, not Chuck.  The damnation of it was that he couldn’t be sure himself.  If Lucifer had been here in Heaven, perhaps he could somehow access the other realities, follow where Chuck might have gone when he disappeared from their home.  Bobby tried to take Kyra’s hand in his again, but Lucifer shook his head slightly.  “No,” he said, and an unseen rush of force pushed the hunter away, stumbling and falling upon the brightly patterned carpet.

Kyra tried to go to him then, but found herself unable to move.  “Crowley?” she said, just that, but Lucifer laughed uproariously.

“She wants you to _help_ her;  isn’t that precious?”

He got to his feet and stretched, leisurely, grinning in anticipation.  “Let’s have a look inside your mind, shall we?  How was your little sideways trip?”  He stood, strolled over to her as though they were all friends, adding to the torment – so he assumed – by spinning out the moment.  The baby near his feet squawked and Lucifer hoisted him in his arms, playing the indulgent father.

Kyra stared over at Bobby and Crowley.   Bobby’s expression was agonised, but Crowley stared at her intently, brows raised as though he had asked her a question.

“Of course, I could just kill you all right now and that would be the easiest,”   Lucifer commented.  “But you’re still useful as bait – not much else, but that for sure – to hook in the Winchesters and Castiel…”

She tuned him out, struggling to get her thoughts clear.  If you listened to him, that was the first step to crazy.  There was something Crowley had said, something he had helped her to do when she had talked to him about her fears for the future.  Something that could only happen when the three of them were in a room with Lucifer.  _Alone_ with Lucifer.  But there was the nephilim child…. The entire memory of the conversation with Crowley rose in her mind, as she met Crowley’s eyes, watching the red flare against the almost golden glint of them.  _There’s a spell.  It allows you to revoke a permission given for possession._    He gave her a slight nod.  He had unlocked the memory.  Kyra closed her eyes, feeling very cold, though the room had felt normal, except for Satan being in it.  

“Say goodbye, Singer,”  Lucifer drawled.  “I can use you for bait and Crowley to help me break down Heaven’s door.  I don’t need this particular little troublemaker, amusing though she’s been, so I think I’ll just use her up and move on.”

Kyra felt something click in her head, a sense of pressure relieved.  “What are you doing?”  Lucifer sounded baffled, ordinarily, human-like, confused.  “You lock the door, sweetie?”  He advanced on her, rapped his knuckles against her forehead.  “Open up!  Ah, that’s better.”

His essence flared out of the Nick host, which fell to the ground like an empty suit.   They all expected the baby simply to fall to the ground and Kyra made a sound of protest, still unable to move to do anything about it.  But to their shock, the form of the child blurred into insubstantiality along with the glowing outline of the archangel who held him.  “Surprise,”   Lucifer’s voice, echoing all around them, mocked.

Bobby shouted, his eyes aching as he failed to shield them completely.   Crowley stood his ground, his gaze intent as he concentrated.   _Right, step two.  Chuck, if you want this to happen, you need to let a demon loose in your bailiwick._

Just as it had happened with Kyra, he felt a change in pressure, and with it, the surging, triumphant sense of power which told him he was once more linked to Hell and could draw upon it.   Crowley smiled like a shark and muttered the words of the spell quickly as he focused his intent.  Then he smelled fire and smoke crackling out of nowhere and Lucifer’s abandoned meatsuit burst into flames.

Lucifer leapt for the only remaining host he believed he could take.   He flowed at Kyra, then abruptly fell back as though a change wind had blown him clear of her.  Bobby ran at him.  Lucifer’s indistinct arm gestured and the hunter was lifted and thrown several metres away, falling heavily to the floor, which was stone under those gaudy rugs.  The glimmering form of the fallen archangel veered up, away from Kyra, back to the meatsuit which lay blackened and useless on the ground.

Then they saw the impossible upon the incredible;  the glimmer of a portal, a long bright streak of silvered air appearing between them and the archangel’s essence.  Crowley saw that he did not have time to do anything, even if he’d had any more plans, and Bobby was still on the ground.

_Your move, Charles.  We’ve got him out of his armour.  If you’re going to bind him and cast him Below once more, now would be a wonderful time.  Or is this it?_

Lucifer’s blurred, shining form, the child held in one arm, seemed to expand towards Kyra like a star about to go nova.  “Don’t look at him!”  Bobby yelled, even as Kyra let out a cry of pain and put a hand to her eyes.   Then the archangel leapt for the widening portal.  “Get him!”   Bobby yelled, but Lucifer passed through and was gone.  “Why didn’t you….blast him or something?”

“Because I can’t,”  Crowley shouted back.  “Only Chuck could have done that and for some reason he didn’t push endgame!  And because we need Lucifer caged _or_ gone if we’re to survive.  His legions are leaderless now and that means they aren’t his any more.  So we have to go, _now_!” He moved swiftly to Bobby and dropped to one knee to put a hand on his shoulder.  “Kyra, here to me.”

He had acted as a demon king here;  the magic he used was from the blackest of the grimoires in Hell’s control.  That damn deal Chuck had offered him was still hanging in the ether;  he could sense it, the way he could feel the operation of Deal Magic.  What would Bobby even want him to do?  He did not know and there was no time;  he could only grip their hands and curse the Almighty to the Empty, for ever and ever amen for the choice that was no choice….

And port….

And see blinding electrical light around him instead of immortal nuclear energy and hear the roar of engines accompanied by the stink of fuel on a freezing Earth night.  The Sons of Anarchy had come to see what the Hell he and Bobby had done to two of their members inside a witch temple, attempting to bring Castiel back through from wherever it was he had been cast. 

That meant, Crowley realised, that more than a few minutes had passed in this reality while he and Bobby had been gone.  It possibly wasn’t even the same night.  Chuck had flipped a switch….or perhaps the fact of Lucifer’s disappearance had done something.  Who knew what the rules were now?   In Heaven, they’d been outside of Earth time, so maybe that was why.

_We told them how dangerous it was because we’d be bringing through three top ranking demons in Castiel’s wake.  Now we’ve got all the literally god-damned host of Hell on our heels.  They will come after us – me – they know Lucifer wanted to destroy all three of us.  This is not going to end well.  I should get out of here, recoup as best I can Somewhere Else;  too bad for anyone else, it always is._

_But it’s Bobby._

He seemed to feel Bobby’s strong arms around him as though he would keep the King of Hell safe.

There was Kyra looking to him to protect and advise.

_I tried to save Sam and Dean from Satan and look where it got me.  Like my unsainted mother said;  they were never even going to invite me to tea._

The two humans were on the ground, Bobby sprawled, trying to get himself organised and Kyra was being sick.  Crowley could only sympathise, whether it was the transit or Lucifer that had brought that on.  _He certainly does that to me, darling._   The powerful lights were blinding even him, the only one on his feet, still not sure precisely where he was or where the motorcycles were moving in relation to him.  A bitter wind blasted through the unprotected flesh of his meatsuit, howling like the damned.  Ah.

It actually was the damned.

Crowley’s vision cleared in time to let him see the storm of disembodied demons roaring overhead in the night, blotting out the stars.  There seemed to be a lot of confused people stumbling around, crying out.  And a circle of massive steel machines with humans astride them, with himself, Bobby and Kyra in the center.  Crowley laughed to see that one of them was a striking, dark-haired woman, who rode a massive Harley behind her son, Jax.  Gemma had made it back and she had warned Jax and the rest of what was coming.  They had not been caught unaware after all.

_I’m making my fucking choice, Chuck!  I’m staying what I am.  I am saving what is mine._

Chuck did not answer him;  it was nothing as defined or certain as that.  But Crowley had the strong feeling that he _had_ been heard, and also the  general sense of something that hadn’t come Crowley’s way in a very, very long time.  Approval.  He wondered suddenly whether Chuck’s offer to him to return to human had been a test.  He thought it had been genuine, being one long practised in lies.  But if he _had_ , and it was the human Fergus McLeod here on Earth with the demonic hordes above, how fucking long would he or any of the humans here have lasted?  Did Chuck even think that through?

He cast another swift look around at the rumbling Harleys and their riders, recognising several more of them, including Tig, who had laughed even while Crowley possessed him;   Venus was riding with him, reminding Crowley of when she and Tig had found him, the first time he’d come back.  Oh Gods, there was Bobby Elvis, broad and hairy and blasphemous and entirely too fascinating.  All of them, the outlaw tribe of those who had survived Lucifer’s rising.  _You can’t leave them either._   The voice wasn’t Chuck’s, speaking in his mind.  It was only him.

Crowley stood nearly naked in the snow, the cold reality of the night around him binding him to this place and time.  He called on all the power he had, all the souls he had ever bound to darkness by their own will.  _“Turn on him!   He’s gone, he’s abandoned you – you know it – but I’m King of Hell and I run Hell for you.  All is forgiven, you morons, come home!”_

It was, he knew with a glowing pride, what the more uncouth such as Dean Winchester would definitely call an oh fuck moment for Satan.  He, the King of Hell, was the demon of the moment.  He had saved the whole damned (above and below) lot of them and not even the Winchesters could deny it.

With Lucifer gone, his hold on the demons had vanished and they had, to a monster, abandoned the Heaven-realm it would have been agony to remain in.  Only Lucifer could have forced them to do it and Hell’s finest had abandoned the battle the millisecond that Lucifer vanished.  They had followed the bait of the King of Hell and the mortals their chief had sought to destroy.

Crowley grinned with ferocious glee at the bikers around him, looking back to Jax and nodding politely to the startled chief of this new post-apocalyptic human tribe.  He felt the abandoned demons answer and clamped his will on them.  _Mine._ They cowered and obeyed.

_“Get back home!   I’ll deal with you when I’m good and ready.”_

Well, maybe not so forgiven as all that.  Forgiveness, after all, wasn’t something his demons would be comfortable with.


	9. Epilogue:  A Little Time to Party

The tribe gathered to feast, one night later while snow fell outside.  The crush of humans might normally have bothered the only demon present;  there was a limit to “keep your enemies close,”  after all and they were in the clubhouse of the Sons of Anarchy, with a fire in the new fireplace built of stones and guards posted outside.  But now, he was comfortably propped against Bobby Singer, sharing a small couch with him and Bobby’s arms were around him, in public and all.  Nothing, absolutely nothing, could bother Crowley right now.

Gemma Morrow was finishing up her tale of escape from Lucifer, with some embellishment, Crowley suspected.  Even with Rowena providing distraction, the only other witch not hosting a demon couldn’t have sneaked away from her duties as nanny/guard to the nephilim without a good dose of _deux ex machina_.  Possibly Lucifer had intended to have them actually teach the half/human, half/angel child what they knew of magic.  It was what he would have done.

If Chuck had tweaked things, as he had with Kyra, he could have done so without Gemma realising.   Getting word to the Sons would have been another tricky proposition and the witch avoided specifying just how she’d managed to fuel the magic to do that.  Crowley knew it would have called for deaths, but he suspected no one else except Bobby was aware of that.

“So there I was, alone on the highway in a winter night, when I heard the sound of engines in front of me.  I almost ran into the forest, no idea who they might be, but something made me wait.”

“And we nearly ran you over, Mom,”  Jax contributed from beside her.  He shook his head in disbelief.  “She was just standing there on the road with her thumb out like a sweetbutt waitin’  for a come ahead.”

Crowley grinned in appreciation.   The role of Jax and the four riders who had gone with him in answer to Gemma’s call for help had been much harder, he knew.  If they’d come to grief anywhere along the road, there would have been no support and no rescue.   The bikers reported few signs of people and no civilisation through the states they had crossed to find Gemma. 

She’d been alone, but in the days following, the army of witches which had been summoned by Lucifer were beginning to find their way home.  Some of those who’d lived in Charming were straggling home even now, and there were scouts from a combined force of the Sons and townsfolk trying to find the lost.  Witches or not, the humans were going to need everyone if they were to survive.  Witches, bikers, townfolk and stranded tourists and even some creatures sometimes termed “monsters,”  if they had any desire to live in civilisation at all.

Three days had passed here since Crowley and Bobby had travelled between worlds.

A sudden crashing sound followed by shouts made Crowley look up again in time to see three men who had not been in the room a moment before, stumbling over various people seated on the ground.  They’d ported in, he saw, into an open space not quite big enough for them to keep their balance and not barge into anyone.  Guns and knives were pulled out in moments and a ring of bikers closed in on the trio.  Bobby and Crowley had already seen – and heard – more than enough to ID them.

“Get on the ground!”  Jax yelled and his brothers took up the order.

“Oh hell,”   Bobby groaned as he listened to the familiar voices loudly complaining.  “It had to be.”

“Mmm,”  Crowley agreed, leaning back to watch the show.

Fortunately, by now the Sons had also recognised at least two of the sudden arrivals within their lair.  Castiel, Dean and Sam reluctantly knelt as directed, hands behind their backs, while the “civilians”  in the room were made to back off.  An area was cleared between them and where Jax sat, opposite Crowley and Bobby.  When the new arrivals were allowed to get up and then pushed closer, they saw first Crowley and then Bobby, very much at their ease.  Crowley leaned back against Bobby and smirked at them.

“Future tip,”   Bobby called.  “Get Cas to bring you to _outside_ the clubhouse and then knock!”

Over the roars of laughter, the Winchesters and Castiel looked to one another and shrugged.  “Yeah, that would possibly have been better,”  Dean admitted when he could be heard.  “Uh, sorry,”   he said to Jax.  “We didn’t know there’d be so many people here.”

“We didn’t know _you_ were back here, Bobby,”  Sam added.  “Last we heard you’d vanished and then the phones went down for good.”  Both the brothers stared at him, specifically at his arm around the King of Hell.  Bobby glared back.  Yeah, he was deeply relieved to see them safe, but that didn’t excuse the stupid staring.

“Three days by your time,”   Bobby said.  “I see Cas found you.  That’s good, since we had to find other help to get home.”

Castiel looked at him as though trying to decipher his meaning.  “I was helping Sam and Dean in Ireland,”  he said.  “The Unseelie Court had taken over and we’ve been fighting on the side of the Seelie Court to recover Parliament.”

“So you’ve literally been away with the fairies, Cas?”   Crowley drawled.

Castiel was about to answer and Dean interrupted him rather desperately.  “When we ‘ported away – when Crowley ported us - we got dumped in some freezing lake in Ireland,”   he shouted over the unfeeling laughter of their audience, “and then the elves fished us out and said we owed them service and Cas agreed with them…”

“They were correct,”  the angel began.

“Yeah, but Ireland’s now a high magic area and spells were working much more effectively than they used to,”   Sam interrupted.  “So the words constituted a spell bond….”

“It was a damn magical noose,”  Dean growled.  “This red glowing line appeared around our necks and Cas told us it was a geas…”

“We had to do service to the Queen of the Seelie Court,”  Sam said doggedly, avoiding Crowley’s gaze and wicked grin.  “Cas too, until they drove the Unseelie Fae out of the Parliament buildings and worked out a deal with the surviving humans.  What the hell happened to you?  And did you find Kyra?”   He looked around, noting the lack of any children or young teens in the room.

“Yeah, we did,”  Bobby said, relenting a little.  Crowley was not likely to have any mercy on this subject for some time so it wouldn’t kill him to be the good cop, he supposed.  “She’s staying here too – it’s kinda crowded but for once I don’t mind havin’  people around.  She’d rather not be on her own.  There’s a mob of kids all under fifteen sharing bunk beds in the same room she had last time she was here.”

“You’re dodging, love,”  Crowley said, very quietly, for him.  Bobby did not particularly want to repeat their story, that he’d already had to tell to Jax and his brothers in “church.”  Most of the survivors of Charming were currently crowded into the clubhouse and looking for entertainment.  So Bobby just glared at Crowley muttered.  He also didn’t want to go outside into the winter cold.

“And Lucifer?”  Dean said it quietly, as though everyone within earshot was not listening intently.

“He, uh, got away through a portal,”  Bobby said, deciding to leave the details about Heaven until later.  “I don’t know who opened it and I don’t know where he or the nephilim went.  Cas?”

“I will have to inquire,”  the angel said.  “I don’t sense him here on this plane,”   he added.  “I presume he is not in the Cage or you would know it?”  It was about as subtle a query as to Crowley’s current status as Castiel could manage, Bobby supposed.

“He’s not,”  Crowley said, with a slight impatient edge to his voice.  It was the first thing he had checked when he found his powers back full force.  His second action, of course, had been reaming new ones for every one of the several thousand demons Lucifer had set free Above, once they’d come crawling back to Hell.  But as he’d told Bobby;  it’s not work if you enjoy it.

Bobby decided it was time to go confidential.  “Mind if I talk to my friends in the room?”  he asked Jax wearily.  “You too, of course, it’s just…”  He waved at the audience and Jax grinned.

“Go ahead, man,”  he said and to the disappointed sounds, “You people are gonna find out eventually but the show’s over for now.  Come on, you’ve seen plenty of magic shit by now.”

Crowley stayed where he was at this, not sure which way things were going to go.  Certainly the Winchesters and the angel would prefer him not to be a part of things and Bobby might well go along with that for now.  But the hunter gestured the others towards the door leading to the rest of the building and then turned to him.  “What’s the matter?  You’re not gonna leave me to do this on my own, are you?”

“No, darling,”  the demon answered soothingly, not letting the sudden shock of delight show on his face.  He accepted Bobby’s hand to get to his feet, even more startled when the hunter firmly held on to him as they walked towards the room.  It wasn’t much;  merely a small room with a bed, a cupboard and a couple of chairs, where club members could sleep over if needed.  But with the present overcrowding, it was a prize Bobby and Crowley valued.

Their company continued to stare, of course.  Bobby relinquished Crowley’s hand for a moment to sit down on the bed, then reached firmly up to draw the demon down beside him.  Sam sighed and took one of the chairs, but Castiel took up a guard-like position near the door and Dean paced the few steps along the floor area between bed and cupboard.

“Get over it,”  Bobby growled, not bothering to specify about what.  “If you can’t, this will be a short debrief, boys.  Hell, it’ll be short anyway.  Ï think we went to the place you found yourself in – alternate world where we’re a TV show.  No magic, well almost no magic.  Sound familiar?   Anyway, seems it runs on a different time schedule or maybe that’s due to Lucifer’s screwing around.  The latter’s Crowley’s theory so ask him if you want to know more.  He showed up a week later by my count, but only a few minutes had passed here.   Took another few weeks for Kyra to find her way to us.  We hadn’t been able to find her.  We did talk to Chuck, soon as we happened to find ourselves on holy ground….and pretty soon after that he took a hand.  Kyra got to us and then he moved us like chess pawns….into Heaven.”

“But he had to know you, uh, got ditched from the place,”  Sam ventured.

“Ditched?  You can say that if you want, but it was the best thing ever happened to me.”  Bobby turned his head slightly to meet Crowley’s eyes. 

“Sheesh, don’t kiss him,”  Dean muttered.

“I said;  get over it,”  Bobby warned, but decided to give Dean a pass.  It had been trying times for them all.  “Also, focus.  Lucifer was there.  We can’t be sure precisely what was going on, we didn’t see any angels at all.  The demons hadn’t made their way in, had they?”  Again he looked at Crowley.

“Lucifer had ways in – back door access, you might say – which demons don’t,”  Crowley said at last.  “Not that he explained how he was apparently holding court in the place, but anyway.”  He shrugged negligently.  “Demons are by their nature banned from Heaven.  I believe I was only able to enter by a technicality;  since while in the other reality I was not a demon, since that state of being involves magic.  So I was Chuck’s ace in the hole, which does _not_ explain how Lucifer was able to escape through a portal, unless those stories about God playing favourites are true, which wouldn’t surprise me.  Chuck probably thought that removing Lucifer from this reality and allowing humans to recover was enough of an intervention and he wasn’t going to sacrifice his first born.  He may have other uses for Lucifer.  I’m only guessing at this point, but that would be my take on it.”

“Did Lucifer pull you into Heaven?” Sam asked, looking from Bobby to Crowley.  Again, Bobby made a gesture to Crowley indicating he had no idea.

“I don’t know,”  Crowley said after a moment’s thought.  His own ignorance clearly irritated him.  “I thought it was Chuck’s move:  Chuck had said he would put us in position, but then Lucifer spoke as though he was responsible.  And then the way he escaped….he took the nephilim with him, which makes me think the child was somehow assisting with the portal.”

“You don’t think Lucifer just wanted to rescue his kid?”  Dean demanded.

“Please.”

“What a shitstorm,”  Dean muttered heavily, but he did nod thanks to Crowley.  “So now what?  We’re headed home soon as we can, since Cas retrieved the car.”   He grinned for the first time since seeing them.  “I guess I can handle Crowley in the back seat if you guys want to ride back with us.”

Neither answered for a moment and Dean exchanged a surprised look with his brother.  “Somebody say something?   Bobby, do you really want to stay here in a feudal system run by a biker gang?”

“How do you know that Lebanon, Kansas is gonna be any better?”  Bobby asked.

“If it isn’t, we can shift to Sioux Falls and team up with Jody and her girls,” Sam pointed out.  “That might be a better idea anyway.”

“Maybe,”  Bobby said, “but you’re forgetting Crowley has his powers back.”  The demon smirked at that.  “No back seats required.  And we’re not done with our work here.  Kyra’s friend Rafael was also lost through a portal and we’ve done nothing to try and find him.  There hasn’t been time.  That was the first thing she asked me when we ended up back here;  to help her find Rafael.  She thinks if we move from the area where he first disappeared, it’s gonna be a whole lot harder to find him.  I don’t know if that’s right or not and yeah, you could argue that Crowley could port us back here just as easily, but I just don’t want to shift any more, not yet.”

“But you will come back, after that?”  Sam asked.

“No promises, Sam.  Maybe.”

The trio left then, with Dean talking to Castiel about maybe ‘porting them over to the bunker to scout out the situation that very night.  Bobby closed the door behind them with a weary sigh.  “Is it ever gonna stop?”  he murmured.  “I better just look in on Kyra…”

“Who’s in a room with nine other kids,”  Crowley chided.  “If anything was happening, we’d hear the screams, love, no matter what we were doing.”

“Somehow that’s not all that comforting,”  Bobby muttered.

“Try this, then,”  Crowley told him as the hunter began slowly to undress.  “Tomorrow, we go back to our house – the place you and Kyra moved into – we batten down whatever hatches need it, we get some rest, we look around and see what’s going on….and then we start thinking about how we can find Kyra’s boyfriend.”

“Don’t call Rafael that!   She’s way too young for a boyfriend.”

“Darling, you had better look again.  By my count she can’t be that far off fourteen.”  He made a meaningful gesture at his chest and Bobby’s face flushed in embarrassment.

“That’s still too young.  And can we get into this discussion some other time?”

“Absolutely.”  Crowley undressed, the slow way, since to him it didn’t appear that his Robert intended to pay him any particular attention in a hurry, then got into the creaky bed, which smelled musty.  Bobby, shivering, since this room was well away from the source of heat, joined him and pulled the several blankets over them.  The raucous noise from the main area of the clubhouse showed no sign of abating despite the lateness.

“Damn it, they’re gonna party for hours,”  Bobby sighed presently.

Crowley smirked to himself and reached for the hunter’s hand, which had warmed up a little under the blankets.  “Well then, we’ll have to find some way to pass the time,”  he purred.  “Their noise will cover any noise from this room;  I know that still bothers you.”

“It’s next thing to public,”  Bobby complained, but the changed note in his voice made Crowley laugh.  He squeezed Bobby’s hand and put his other hand on the hunter’s chest, enjoying the strong muscles under his touch, the warmth, the mortal life of him.   Bobby brought Crowley’s hand to his own cheek and held it there, wordless, then slid his free arm around him.  “But I guess it’s the first time in awhile we got other folks watching out for Kyra…and us, come to think of it.  We should maybe make the most of it.”

“Absolutely, Robert.”

 _We’re due a little partying, lover._   _And Chuck, if you’re listening, give us a break for awhile, hmm?_

******************************************

Hexagram 64 of the I Ching

_"Now it is the time of struggle. The transition must be completed. We must make ourselves strong in resolution; this brings good fortune. All misgivings that might arise in such grave times of struggle must be silenced. It is a question of a fierce battle to break and to discipline the Devil's Country, the forces of decadence. But the struggle also has its reward. Now is the time to lay the foundations of power and mastery for the future. "_

This hexagram indicates a time when the transition from disorder to order is not yet completed. The change is indeed prepared for, since all the lines in the upper trigram are in relation to those in the lower. However, they are not yet in their places. While the preceding hexagram offers an analogy to autumn, which forms the transition from summer to winter, this hexagram presents a parallel to spring, which leads out of winter's stagnation into the fruitful time of summer. With this hopeful outlook the Book of Changes come to its close.

 _lias_  Yijing, I Ching, Yi King, I Ging, Zhou yi, The Classic of Changes (Lynn), The Elemental Changes (Nylan), Le Livre des Changements (Javary), Das Buch der Wandlung. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to anybody who made it to the end of this. 
> 
> While most Supernatural fic (and of course the show itself) focuses on the Winchesters and mentions characters like Crowley and Bobby in the background, only occasionally focusing on them, I like to do the opposite :-) So in my 'verse, I only briefly refer to what the Winchesters are doing.
> 
> I may write more if folk like and I'm considering a crossover to another fictional universe.


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